


All Doctors Worn and Weary

by Crimsoncat (Crimson_cat)



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Adult Content, Animal Death, Binge Drinking, Canonical Character Death, Explicit Language, F/M, Gore, Long-Distance Friendship, Medicinal Drug Use, Prescription Drug Abuse, Reader Insert, Reader-Insert, Spoilers, Veterinary Medicine, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-02-04
Updated: 2014-10-06
Packaged: 2018-01-11 06:48:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 13
Words: 49,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1169951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimson_cat/pseuds/Crimsoncat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the early 23rd century, the advent of food synthesizers decimated Earth’s veterinarians. 150 years later, your graduating class is the first to compete for jobs in a saturated market. However, your low GPA repeatedly sends your résumé to the trash bin. Meanwhile, Starfleet is clamoring for civilian vets in the wake of booming interplanetary trade. Out of options, you accept a ten year commission as an animal product inspector. 63 light years from home, on the far-flung outpost: Deep Space Nine, you are overworked, understaffed, and slowly adapting to life on the edge of the wormhole.</p><p>Too bad vet school never taught you how to deal with prevaricating tailors, naively idealistic doctors, or Cardassian voles.</p><p>You X Dr. Bashir or You X Garak</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Not the First Choice

**Author's Note:**

> **Personal Acknowledgements:** This story is dedicated to my good friend and beta-reader: **Geckomama**. Without her inspirational support, fantastic imagination, and tolerance for my obsessive tendencies, this fanfiction would still be an off-handed comment made after a long day of vet school. I can never thank her enough for everything she has done for me. If anyone in this universe deserves a happy ending, it is her.  
>  **Disclaimer** : Star Trek is owned by Gene Roddenberry and CBS, Paramount, and Viacom. The “All Creatures Great and Small” series is owned by James Alfred Wight, OBE, FRCVS. I do not own any part of either fandom, and I do not make any money from these writings. This is a work of pure fiction and any character's resemblance to any person, living or dead, is purely coincidence.
> 
>  **About the Warnings:** This story starts out at about a PG-13 level. Future chapters will include graphic sex, prescription drug abuse, binge drinking, descriptions of voles being gutted, the death of good friends, and the liberal use of the word "Fuck". I have rated this story accordingly.
> 
> If this fanfiction goes as planned, we will journey from mid-season two to the show finale (season seven). Please be aware that this fanfiction will likely become monstrous (longer than a novel).
> 
>  
> 
> **Chapter 1 starts at the very end of Season 2, Episode 17 (Playing God).**

__

All creatures sick and dreary  
All things that groan and cough  
All Doctors worn and weary  
Still can’t get a day off

“OW! Crap…” you moaned, feeling your shoulder protest the large load. “Maybe I should have asked the freighter crew for help after all.”

In one hand you held a large pet carrier with a ratty pink towel over the top. Over the other shoulder you had an unwieldy duffle bag containing one litter box, two “small” reptile hides, a folded up rubber water dish and a soft baby blanket wrapped around two ceramic heat emitters. The bag was so large you needed to brace it with your other hand to prevent it from dragging you off balance. On your back, there was a small pack containing a few personal effects and one change of uniform.

Slowly teetering down the darkened hallway of the Habitat Ring, you noted the depressingly plain design of dark grey arches on a light grey background on all the walls. The overhead lighting was much darker than you were used to. Though the walls also had blue lighting panels, they did not provide much illumination. The whole place seemed as cold and dreary as a cloudy, rainy day. The carpet was light grey, again, with a stripe of maroon red down the center. You supposed that Cardassians weren’t much for bright colors.

After what seemed like an endless shuffle, you finally spotted the access panel to your quarters. Bracing yourself against the wall, you reached out slowly with your left arm. Between the strain on your shoulder and the pins and needles feeling in your fingers, you realized you would not be able to use the panel very easily. Finally, you just gave up.

“Computer: Open the Door to Chamber 892, Habitat Level H-3. Authorization: Vet-Beta-6-2.”

As soon as the doors opened, you stumbled into the room and dropped the duffle bag as gently as possible for its weight. The stabbing feeling in your fingers lingered as you rotated your left shoulder in slow, wide circles.

“Ow…. Shoulder. Pain. Ow. Ow. Ow.”

The cage in your right hand shifted violently. You could hear the skittering sound of nails on hard plastic as you twisted your wrist to right the carrier. Of course, as soon as you moved your hand, the creature within flung itself to the other side of the box. Your overcompensation sent the animal thumping into the hard plastic wall. Leaning back at the waist, you finally managed to balance the load.

“Okay okay! Hold still Joannah!” you begged. You bent your back, muscles straining to hold the carrier upright. “I gotta put you down first!”

The cage hit the floor harder than you intended. More skittering noises could be heard. You flung yourself onto the carpet. Lifting up the ratty pink towel, you peered into the darkened box. In the lights of the quarters, you made out the brassy olive scales your lizard’s tail. It was raised defensively towards the metal door of the carrier. Her head was ducked, golden eyes wide and looking for threats.

“OH! Sorry honey! I’m so sorry! You okay?”

The savannah monitor within the box flicked her blue forked tongue at you. You lowered the towel over the door.

“I’ll stop stressing you out now. Poor thing.”

Slipping off your pack, you surveyed your new quarters. The living room contained a dark grey rectangular dining table. The set came with four matching chairs. On the left wall was a Cardassian style replicator. It was much larger than the standard Starfleet replicators you’d seen, and rather resembled an angry bat. In the right front corner of the room was a large, semicircular medical consul with a view screen. Beyond the dining table was a cloth couch, two lounge chairs and an oval, glass topped coffee table. The couch was pressed against the back wall where three large circular windows looked out into the depths of space. The room was much larger than you expected for one person. You supposed you got large quarters since you were an officer.

You could see two doors near the back windows. They were directly opposite each other on each side of the room. Leaving your Joannah in her cage, you walked to the back left door. It hissed open, leading to a bedroom. There was another circular window on the right with a black dresser in front of it. On the left was a bed with grey sheets and a triangular pillow. Furthest from the window was another door. When you peaked in, you realized it was a walk in closet. Feeling very curious, you strolled back out, through the living room to the other door in the living area. You found a bathroom complete with a sonic shower, a sink, a toilet and a bathtub. The bathtub surprised you somewhat. Who was wasteful enough to use that much water on a space station?

You made your way back the the living room. Electing to leave Joannah in peace for a little longer, you attacked your duffle bag. First, you unwrapped your heat emitters from the blanket. Next, you grabbed the two small hides. You tucked one along the front wall near to your consul. The other hide went between the dining room table and the back of a lounge chair. You walked back over to the bag and began untangling the cords of the heat emitters. For now, you placed one heat emitter near the hide by the chair. You made sure it was set for about 32C. The other emitter set for 38C, you constructed a basking spot near your desk. You planned on moving the heaters around tomorrow when you got the rest of your luggage off the ship.

After placing your belongings, you walked over to the replicator and began setting some pre-programmed menu items. You added three temperature settings to your equipment. The first was 25C for drinking water. The second was 30C for Joannah’s soaking tub. The third was 32C for wiping down Joannah as needed. You replicated the drinking water and paper towels. The paper towels went into the litter box. You knew Joannah would need a nesting box with loose substrate later, but you opted to worry about that tomorrow. Then you filled up the rubber tub with fresh drinking water. You sloshed your way over to the sofa area, placing the black bath near the coffee table.

“Computer: Lock the door, dim the lights by 60% and raise interior temperature to 27C.”

Finally, after all the preparations were made, you lifted the towel off of Joannah’s cage. She was alert, but no longer defensive.

“Okay little girl, come on out,” you cooed, opening the carrier door. Backing away, you allowed her to move in her own time.

After a long thirty seconds, Joannah peaked her blue and gold patched head out of the cage. Cautiously, she flicked her tongue multiple times to smell the area. You watched quietly as Joannah leaned into the room. She held her head high, looking around warily. She paused there for a moment as she slowly analyzed her new environment. When she finally deemed it acceptable, she gracefully lifted herself into a sinuous high legged strut. Her golden eyes were ever vigilant. She took a few steps, and stopped to survey her new domain. Then, very slowly, she continued on her path. She finally crawled into the hide nearest the chair, tucking her tail in with her. The plastic cave moved a bit as she turned around to look out the front entrance. She would not be caught off guard. Satisfied that your lizard was safe, you turned to the computer.

The light from the computer screen filled the living room with a blue-white glow. You removed your commbadge from your uniform as you sat down. Leaning back into the desk chair, you immediately set about placing your very first deep space transmission. Your body hummed with excitement when a familiar mocha skinned, Vulcan face glowed on the screen.

“Hey T’Kel. Promised I’d call you when I got in!” you said cheerfully.

“You did,” she agreed. “Are you aware it is 0400 here?”

“Whoops!” you replied, scratching you head. “Forgot about the time difference. Should I call back later?”

“That is unnecessary,” she returned. “I was awake.”

“Seriously?!” you asked. “Doing what?”

“I have an FACUC **[1]** protocol to review. I need to be prepared to discuss it by 0800 tomorrow. My work today did not permit me to finish it sooner.”

“How many pages have you read so far?”

“Eighty seven.”

You whistled in sympathy.

“How many need correction?”

“I have found seventeen errors.”

“Sleep is for the weak I suppose…” you mused, resting your head on your hand. You noted that the pins and needles were gone. When had that happened? “I admit I’m jealous. You’d think with all the research on this station that we’d have our own Care and Use Committee.”

More tapping came from your friend's side of the conversation. She rested her head on her left hand and highlighted something on her PADD screen. It occurred to you that T'kel must be very tired. She almost never slouched. “You would still need an outside party to be involved," she pointed out.

“There are civilians on the station.”

“Yes, but the station is much smaller than a planet. There is a good chance that someone on your committee might know the civilian that is chosen. If you send out your protocols it accomplishes the same goal and avoids all conflicts of interest.”

“Ugh, all this red tape gives me a headache,” you groaned. “Please tell me you’re enjoying yourself at least.”

T’Kel pushed her pixie cut, black hair behind her pointed ear. “The head of the medical research program is very efficient.”

You raised an eyebrow and smiled. “A high compliment.”

“Indeed.”

“Am I still your favorite?” you questioned with wide grin.

“If it pleases you,” she replied succinctly, typing something into her computer.

“Oh T’Kel, you’re so _adorable_!” you cooed, shifting your head to the desktop. “I miss your three word responses so much.”

“That was four words.”

“Close enough for government work,” you remarked with a dismissive wave.

“How is your work environment on DS9?”

The smile on your face shrunk by two teeth. You lifted your head from the desktop, and glanced away from the computer with a small sigh. Willing your lips back into a half-hearted grin, you shrugged at the screen. “I didn’t run into many people since it’s late here too. Ops was so empty I had a hard time getting my communicator and room assignment. I have to go back tomorrow to meet with the Commander. He was already gone for the evening.”

T’Kel’s eyebrow lifted at your blasé remarks. “You are unhappy.”

It was not a question. It was a statement.

You flung your hands out, waving them wildly in front of the display. “No no no! Nothing like that!” You paused for a moment before letting your shoulders droop a bit. “It’s just… Not my first choice… you know?”

T’Kel’s stare was as emotionless as ever. You felt a small sinking in your gut as memories of school conversations played in the back of your mind. Your eyes met hers. The room was silent save for the quiet hum of all the nearby electronics. Though no words passed between you, many things were understood. When the mood became too much, you faked a laugh.

“Well you know… beggars can’t be choosers and all that. I should just be happy I have a job. That’s an awful lot to be thankful for in this market.”

“I can be reached anytime you require me…” T’Kel said slowly.

“No no!” you protested. Despite yourself, the sinking feeling in your stomach lightened at her words. “We both have jobs now, right? We’re like responsible adults and everything.”

No comment came across the view screen. Your friend’s stare remained unbroken. You shook your head and grinned heartily at her. “I’ll be alright. I promise!”

It was a moment longer before T’Kel’s dark eyes finally stopped trying to see through you. You breathed a sigh of relief when her inspection ended. Years of friendship added layer upon layer of subtext to every fidget you made. You knew better than to think she was really convinced. She knew better than to confront you.

“You will contact me weekly as agreed?”

“Every Tuesday. Even if just to say ‘I’m alive’.” you nodded. “Let me know what time works for you.”

“2300 is sufficient. I will contact you if my schedule changes.”

“Like-wise,” you promised. “Now stop using me to avoid your homework!”

T’Kel nodded back and signed off.

“Friggen Vulcan mind readers,” you groaned, sinking deep into your standard issue chair. “How am I supposed to convince her I’m alright when she can do that staring thingy?!”

Your eyes drifted down to the small overnight bag on the floor. It contained a pair of pajamas, a sonic tooth brush, a hair brush, some undergarments, and a uniform. The bulk of your luggage would be unloaded tomorrow from the freighter. The day after that, you would assume your duties. Now that the adrenaline rush of reaching your quarters was over, you were very glad you arrived early. The Space Lag was dragging you down already. A starship could have made the journey to DS9 in less than a week, but a freighter was another thing entirely. It was too bad you had just missed the last starship heading out this way. Still, the two week journey by freighter was faster than waiting three weeks for another Federation vessel to come this way.

After a few notes in your personal log, you decided on a sonic shower. Then you changed into your night clothing and dragged yourself over into the bedroom. You tested your new bed with a skeptical poke. The mattress was so firm it would have made an excellent sparing mat. Despite your reservations, you climbed onto the pad. As your back popped in protest, you realized your initial assessment was correct.

“The Cardassians call this a bed?” you muttered to yourself with a yawn. “I think the floor has more give”.

It was the last thing you recalled saying before you drifted off to sleep.

**Personal Log: Stardate 47613.8**  
 _I have finally arrived at DS9. Somehow none of this seems real. The Terellian freighter I hitched a ride on was so slow, I thought I’d die in transit._

_Here I am exaggerating again. T’Kel says I’m always doing that._

_I tried my best to put on a good show of it for her. I don’t know why I even bothered. She knows I never wanted to be here. Let the adrenaline jockeys hang out on some backwater space station at the end of the alpha quadrant. I’d take a job in an easy going general practice any day. Heck, I’d even take a research lab job. Sure, they still have tons of paperwork, but Starfleet wants the same forms, in triplicate! I guess this is what I get for telling the Vet Acad I wanted to work on exotics during my interview._

_I’m so out of luck. I had to take this job. I don’t even like doing inspection work. I certainly don’t want to be locked into it for 10 years._

_At least I don’t have to go to write another cover letter. I must have wasted hours doing that. I don’t know why I bothered with it either. With a GPA like mine, I’m sure every hospital just threw my application away._

_Geeze, I really need to suck it up. All this whining about the job I worked so hard to get and I haven’t even started I yet! I’ve wanted to be a veterinarian my whole life. I slaved through four years of college and another four at the Veterinary Academy to get this far. I got my dream, just not my dream job. However, at some point, I have to do something with my degree. I can’t just sit here and do nothing._

_I’ve got to improve myself! If we all were that lazy, we’d have to go back to using money!_

**Computer: End Log**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **[1]** The FACUC, Federation Animal Care and Use Committee, was created as a replacement for the old Earth IACUC (Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee) and similar regulating bodies on other Federation worlds. The FACUC reviews research protocols and monitors the care of animals living in Federation institutions. Every institution in the Federation conducting research is required to have a FACUC. In the event that the facility (such as a starship) is not of sufficient size to support its own FACUC, it shall fall under the jurisdiction of the nearest Federation station or planet with adequate resources.The members of the FACUC must fulfill the following roles: a veterinarian with expertise in the species in question, a practicing scientist experienced with research involving animals, a person who is not involved in scientific pursuits, and a member with no relation to any institution under the FACUC's jurisdiction other than being on the committee. A member may fulfill more than one role, but there must be at least five members on the committee.
> 
> In addition to approving research protocols, the FACUC is required to evaluate and inspect all animal care facilities every six months. Each FACUC must report the current state of all animals under its care to the Federation Council for Non-Sentient Entities (FCNSE) every 12 months. Any noncompliance with approved animal protocols or violations of animal welfare regulations must be reported immediately along with what steps the FACUC has taken to correct the matter. Each FACUC is required by law to protect those who report violations from any retribution. All facilities housing animals are subject to random, unannounced inspections by FCNSE officials.All protocols approved by the FACUC must provide documented proof that the study in question does not unnecessarily duplicate any existing studies and that the animal involvement in this study will significantly add to the existing body of knowledge. Each study must use the minimum number of animals possible to obtain valid data. In addition, the protocol must show all nonanimal models available have been considered and are inadequate for obtaining the required data. Before submitting a protocol, holographic simulations of the study must be run showing that the proposed study poses no significant risk of harm to the animals or their welfare. The FACUC has the right to reject any protocol if it does not meet or exceed the aforementioned criteria.
> 
>  **Bonus:**[ A fantastic fanart of the first scene from the fabulous **Geckomama**](http://i1304.photobucket.com/albums/s525/Alldoctorswornandweary/969305_10101726649707032_2051635708_n_zpsdd43e643.jpg). Note: Geckomama maintains that the main you character is not necessarily white with brunette hair. This is simply one interpretation.


	2. Meet and Greet

By 0600 the next morning, you were awake. You lay on the stiff mattress with your eyes closed for a little while. You contemplated going back to sleep before you remembered you promised to get your luggage early this morning. The freighter captain wanted to leave by 0830. With a deep yawn, you stretched your arms wide. More protesting joint pops could be heard as you turned and lifted yourself off the mattress.

“Friggen Cardassian beds. I know they’re lizards, but do they really like sleeping on rocks that much?”

Stumbling into the living room with one eye open, you tumbled towards the replicator. You rasped out an order for highly caffeinated black tea. Clutching the warm cup greedily, you slithered over to a lounge chair and slowly sank into the cushions. You heard a small rustling from Joannah’s hide. Sipping from your cup, you turned to stare sleepily at the plastic cave. Savannah monitors were diurnal lizards. Joannah wasn’t likely to wake until later.

You finished your drink as quickly as possible and glanced over at the clock. It was 0620. The caffeine was already dragging your drowsy mind into the world of the living. Riding on its strength, you dressed, locked the door to your quarters and made your way down to the docking ring.

 

At 0730, you thanked the freighter crewman who had helped you carry your things and let the doors of your quarters slip closed. Ordering up a croissant from the replicator, you began to unpack and arrange your belongings. You placed the largest of Joannah’s hides by the sofa and widows, and decided to leave your casual clothing in the box for now. Joannah’s nesting box found a home on the unoccupied side of the consul for the time being. By the time 0800 rolled around, you had finished storing your medical school notes and other materials in a heap in your bedroom. A quick look in the mirror reminded you exactly how little rest you got on the journey. You took a moment to cover the bags under your eyes with a light coat of concealer. Joannah still refused to stir from her hide. You couldn’t blame her. You wanted to crawl back onto your rock and go back to sleep.

Leaning over the computer screen you commanded: “Computer: bring up a map of the station.” A glowing red blueprint of DS9 appeared before you. Each deck was layered over the others, but you could click on any of them to bring the levels up separately. A few clicks in, it occurred to you that you couldn’t read the tiny labels very easily. You tried to follow the small script, but discovered it just gave you a headache.

“Computer, display fastest route to Ops.” The computer made a mechanical chirping noise before highlighting the route to the nearest Turbolift. You traced the line with your finger for a moment. Then, you turned to face the door, closed your eyes and mentally walked the route. Your hands twitched in the direction of your movement, body turning the appropriate way as necessary. Finally, your eyes opened and you strode to the door.

“Let’s just hope I don’t get lost again…” you muttered.

 

Several wrong turns later, you finally managed to walk off the turbolift into Ops. The room was decorated in the same drab grey as the rest of the station. Stepping off the turbolift you noticed a transporter pad on the right. Further along to the left on the same level were the doors to an office of sorts. Two steps down from your level was a large, oval shaped console. Directly in front of you and down four steps down from your level was a lowered floor with multiple large consoles. To one side of this lower platform was some sort of pit with a ladder hanging on the edge. On the opposite side of the room but on the same level as you was another Turbolift.

Various personnel were seated around the area, monitoring station functions. During your scan of the room, you noticed snidely that there was not a single unattractive person in all of Ops. Your eyes searched for the least busy person, but there didn’t appear to be a clear candidate. In fact, everyone seemed so busy no one even noticed you had arrived. Shifting your weight from one leg to the other, you felt an uncomfortable prickling of the hair on your neck. As one ensign walked by, you raised a hand to flag them. As they neared, you found your voice absent and your throat closing. You stood there like a uniformed scarecrow as they walked right past you.

You cursed yourself silently. Dragging your courage behind you like screaming child, you boldly walked over to the closest person.

“Pardon me,” you started politely. You kept your hands tucked firmly at your sides to avoid playing with your fingers. Instead, you found yourself nervously fiddling with your pocket. “I’m the new veterinarian. I arrived late last night and was told to come back this morning to speak with Ops before I started my duties tomorrow. Is Commander Sisko available?”

The young woman at the oval console looked up at you with impossibly large sapphire eyes. Her frame was light and lean. She reminded you of a dancer. You noted the unique Trill spots running down both sides of her beautifully sculpted face and long neck. Her glowing, creamy skin covered cheek bones which looked like they’d been polished to a perfect finish. When she smiled you were nearly blinded by the whiteness of her teeth.

Geeze! Is it a requirement to be a minimum of 8/10 to work here?

“So you’re the new veterinarian. We weren’t expecting you until tonight,” she replied. She folded her hands neatly across her console and gave you her complete attention. “I’m Lieutenant Dax, the science officer.”

“OH!” you exclaimed, recognition suddenly smacking you in the face. “The Lieutenant Dax I’ll be working with.”

During the pause in conversation, you mentally kicked yourself. Of course you’d be working with her. You’d be working with everyone on the station. What a stupid thing to say!

“Nervous about your first day?” she asked knowingly. Her smile never faded. That alone made you feel a little bit better.

“Somehow, I can’t escape the feeling that the forty five day, crash course training Starfleet gave me just didn’t cover everything.”

“Hm… You’re probably right,” she agreed. Her comforting smile rolled into a thoughtful look. She cocked her head slightly to the side and gazed up at you playfully. “But that’s the fun of working out here. It doesn’t come in the manual.”

Somewhat bewitched, you nodded to acknowledge the comment, but certainly not to agree with it.

“Dax!” a robust, booming voice called from across the room. “I take it your initiate is gone?”

“Yes, Commander. Arjin left last night.” Dax responded, looking over your shoulder. You turned to see a tall, ebony skinned man in a red and black uniform strolling down the stairs. His shoulders were broadly built and properly squared by years of formal military training. Every step he took was decisive and deliberate, only bolstered by an obvious air of confidence and command. Your eyes flitted to the three golden pips on his right collar. As he neared, you straightened your own back and took a deep breath.

“Commander Sisko, I presume?” you asked, sticking out a hand. He looked at you for a moment before a pleased smile crossed his face. His large hand grasped yours with polite but solid pressure.

“You presume correctly,” he confirmed, finishing the handshake. His deep brown eyes gave you a once over similar to the one you just gave him. You did your best to stand at attention like you had practiced in training. “You must be the vet. I was told you would be dropping by Ops this morning. I’m sorry I couldn’t greet you last night.”

You shook your head to wave off his concerns. “I didn’t arrive until quite late. I must admit, I was somewhat relieved that no one was up to greet me. I certainly didn’t feel at my best once I got in. Terellian freighters often cut costs by skimping on the beds.”

“I trust you are feeling better now?” he inquired. You hoped he wouldn’t notice the deep bags under your concealer.

“Oh yes,” you lied. “Much more rested. By tomorrow I should be back up to speed.”

“Good, I’m glad to hear it,” Sisko replied. You weren’t convinced you’d fooled him, but were grateful that he didn’t push the subject. “Speaking of which, we weren’t expecting you until tonight.”

“I am sorry about that.” You shrugged sheepishly. “I sent a subspace communication from the freighter, but their systems were unreliable at best.” At these words, visions of the patched up, taped up, barely holding up comm units on the freighter flashed through your memories. “They ended up canceling a cargo drop off and we were able to decrease the trip by about 20 hours.”

“It probably works better that way. Gives you some time to recover from your journey.”

“My thoughts exactly.”

“Well, since you’re here…” Sisko’s previously neutral face darkened over with a seriousness normally reserved for judges before the final verdict. “How do you feel about voles?”

“Voles, Sir?” you questioned slowly.

“Especially those of the Cardassian persuasion,” he added, a frustrated shadow crossing his visage.

You hedged around the statement, probing for more information. “Commander, you’ll have to be more specific. What exactly do you want to know about them?”

At that moment, sparks flew out from the bottom of an access panel on the other side of Ops. A thin trail of smoke edged its way out the bottom of the metal console. The scent of burning hair wafted across the room, dancing on the slight breeze from the air recycling system. The putrid smell of charred flesh tickled in your nostrils, threatening to make you sneeze. Bringing a hand to pinch your nose, your eyes flicked back to Commander Sisko. His lips curled into an annoyed grimace as he raised a hand to his temple and massaged it lightly.

“How to get rid of them.”

Stomach sinking, you racked your brain trying to recall any piece of information that might help you. You were totally at a loss. They didn’t cover Terran voles in vet school, let alone their Cardassian relatives. In fact, they barely covered rodents except in your exotics elective. Of course, that was two years ago now. You couldn’t recall much of anything at the moment, but you didn’t want to disappoint your Commander on your first meeting. Between the time elapsed and terror, you drew a complete blank. With a cold sweat beading down your neck, you decided to, very professionally, stall for time.

“Tell me more about these voles,” you prompted. “What is the situation exactly?”

“Our little vole problem started when we moved into new sections of station,” the Commander explained, looking directly at you. “They’ve been here since the Cardassians controlled DS9. They were in hiding until we started using the abandoned areas. Now they’re everywhere. They seem to be attracted to electromagnetic fields. They are eating through the wires and giving our chief of Engineering quite a headache. We’ve even lost biocontainment fields and shields because of them. They are fast becoming more of a threat than an annoyance.”

You fought not to fidget under his sober gaze. Whether he intended it or not, he had a very obvious air of authority that strongly reminded you of Dr. Talrak, one of your professors at the Vet Acad. Professor Talrak had terrified you in the same way that a policeman might terrify a criminal holding stolen jewelry. While you were busy willing yourself to breath naturally, your mind finally started working again. You recalled rodents needed to chew to grind down their teeth. Chewing made sense. Good good. It was coming back to you slowly. Ask more questions dummy!

“I see. So... what have you done so far?”

“Shoot them on sight,” he stated sourly.

Okay, so they’re killing them. How are they handling the dead carcasses? Are they protecting themselves from disease? Oooooohh, you could use that!

“Honestly Sir, I’m a doctor not an exterminator,” you explained. “However, if you give me some time I’ll look up some Cardassian vole behavior and see what I can come up with. In the mean time, I have some concerns about potential Zoonotic diseases **[1]**. For example, Terran voles and other rodents can carry Hantavirus.”

“Hantavirus?”

“A respiratory virus. It’s spread by the secretions and dried fecal dust. We’ve never been able to eradicate it from the wild populations, even in this century.” You paused for a moment, gesturing with your head to the crew currently in Ops. “It’s just an example, but I’d rather not have everyone getting sick. If you’re going to be handling these voles or crawling around in their dust, you need to wear some Personal Protective Equipment. I would like you to start wearing masks and gloves. Also, wet down any feces before you clean it up. That will help things from becoming aerosolized. After that, I recommend everybody wash their hands thoroughly. The voles might be disease free, and I’d rather not discover otherwise.”

Ho damn! Someone deserves a pat on the back for pulling that out of your ass. You actually sounded competent for a minute there.

“Agreed. We’ll tell everyone to start wearing masks and gloves.” Sisko nodded. One of the lights above you flickered and you both looked up. The sound of little tiny claws on metal puzzled you and seemed to infuriate the good Commander. He shot you a very defeated look. “I want you to do that research and let me know what you find. Let’s hope there’s something that can help us stop these voles.” Sisko paused thoughtfully for a moment, casting a withering glance at a damaged control panel. Then he turned back to you. “Onto other business, I assume you would like to tour the station. Have you been to Sickbay yet?”

“Not yet. It was my next stop.”

Sisko acknowledged you with a relieved glance and tapped his commbadge. “Sisko to Dr. Bashir.”

Barely a second later, the communicator chirped to life. You heard a distinctively British voice say: “This is Bashir. Go ahead Commander.”

“Doctor, your animal counterpart is here early. I’m sending her over to Sickbay now,” the Commander explained. He looked you up and down once more. Already feeling more self-assured by your recent helpfulness, you didn’t need to change your body position this time. Shoulders back and expression keen, you waited contentedly for his next suggestion. “I’m sure you’re busy, but would anyone be free to give her a fast tour of the station?”

A slight crackling was heard on the commline before the disembodied voice said: “Actually, I need a break from writing my methods and materials section. I’d be happy to show her around.”

“Excellent, we’ll send her your way.” Sisko closed the communication line. With a subtle gesture towards the exit he added: “I trust you can find your way there?”

“I hope so,” you replied with a smile. You started to walk towards the Turbolift when a thought hit you. You turned back to Sisko. He was already up the first step, heading back to his office. “Oh, Commander! When do you want the report on the voles?”

Sisko paused, for a moment and then said: “As soon as you’re settled in. Obviously, sooner is better than later.”

“Yes, sir!” you returned, getting into the lift. With the push of a button, you watched the intense lights of Ops disappear as you began your newest journey.

 

By the time you reached Sickbay, you needed to ask for directions twice. Relief washed over you as soon as the doors slid open. You scanned the room eagerly. To your left was a single Biobed with monitors in a rounded out section. There was bronze colored door slightly to the right of this. Continuing to the right was a large console with medical screens, a semicircle storage area for medical supplies, and a curved back corner which lead to another door. Right next to you was a smaller semicircular console which you suspected was for the doctor on staff. You took a few steps into the room, looking for anyone to speak with. The whole place was rather deserted.

From what you read in the technical manual, there were ten doctors total on the station. Five of them had ER training. In addition, there were nine medical technicians and twenty nurses from Starfleet and Bajor. The 8.75 hour shifts called for only one doctor, two nurses and two technicians. The other doctors were likely working on their research projects or enjoying a day off. As you were the only veterinarian, you knew you would work longer hours than all of them. Also, you did not have a certified tech. You would have to train a humanoid nurse to help you if you required assistance.

“Ah! There you are!” a cheerful voice called from the main entrance.

You turned back to the Sickbay doors to see a tall, slight man wearing the aqua and black medical uniform. He was younger than you expected, with a puff of wavy brown hair. His clean shaven face and broad grin only added to his boyish appearance. From the pips on his collar, you noted that he was a Lieutenant, the same rank as you **[2]**.

“Dr. Julian Bashir, Chief Medical Officer,” he proclaimed brightly, thrusting his hand towards you. You returned the handshake. It was less gripping than the Commander’s, but far more vigorous and excited. You stared at him questioningly. He seemed to catch the look and raised a concerned eyebrow. “Sorry, is something the matter?”

“Just surprised I guess,” you offered, shaking your head. Your eyes scanned his face only to catch one of two slight creases. None of his wrinkles or worry lines were very deep at all. “Somehow, I thought the Chief Medical Officer would be older.”

Dr. Bashir’s grin only seemed to widen at your comment about his age. His words came in a torrent that left you nearly breathless as it swept the conversation away.

“I graduated from Starfleet medical a year and a half ago. Fun times and all that, but lots of studying. I was Salutatorian. Of course, I would have been Valedictorian had I not mistaken a preganglionic fiber for a postganglionic nerve during the orals. Still, Salutatorians usually get their top choice. I certainly got mine. Actually, I also had the option to stay in on Earth in Paris, but I’m sure you understand how the excitement of being out on the frontier just calls to people,” he explained.

Wide eyed and choking on his endless stream of thought, you tried to avoid letting it show. Dr. Bashir hadn’t taken a single breath, and you very much doubted he would need to come up for air anytime soon. You, however, were drowning in the monologue, and half tempted to yell for a life raft. Much to your dismay, he pressed on with raging enthusiasm.

“I’m so glad I got this post. I didn’t want to sit around at a cushy job close to home. The far flung reaches of the quadrant, now there’s where real men are made! I don’t know what I’d do if I had ended up a simple researcher on some lab on Earth.” 

Aggravation strengthening you against the swell, your eye twitched visibly. You cocked your head sharply to the side, and bit back your initial thoughts on where Dr. Bashir could go in the future.

“Oh really?” you murmured somewhat innocently. You smiled at him sharply and shot him a pointed look. “My best friend graduated near the top of our class too. She got her first choice as well. She’s a veterinary researcher at some lab on Earth.”

Dr. Bashir’s grin melted like a sugar cube in sea water.

“Ah, I didn’t mean-” he started.

“No,” you cut him off, glad that he was rather speechless. “I’m sure you didn’t.” Taking a few steps further into the room, you noticed there was not anyone else around. “How strange. If you’re working on your research today, then who is working here? I thought there was always a doctor on staff. I don’t even see a technician. Where is everyone?”

“Oh I’m sure they’re around somewhere. Probably in the surgical suit,” he explained, pointing towards the back door nearest the crescent console. Before he could continue the thought, you plunged into the conversation.

“Ah, good. For a moment there, I was beginning to think you were the only other doctor on the station,” you admitted.

When no wave of words rolled over you, you glanced over at your companion. Dr. Bashir still looked somewhat nervous. His eyes looked over your face as if he was trying to read your mind in your expression. You supposed you should forgive him his silly slip of the tongue. There was no point in picking fights on the first day. Besides, he had apologized. Sort of. 

Taking a deep breath, you turned towards your new colleague. Fixing him with a soft, appreciative smile, you added: “I want to thank you for taking time out of your day to show me around, Dr. Bashir. It’s very kind of you.”

For a moment, it looked like everything was calm. Dr. Bashir’s face was whirling with happiness. His stood a little taller, chest puffed out just a bit more than before. You watched his excitement rise higher and higher, the impending stream of words threatening to be greater than the last surge. Steadying yourself, you waited for the incoming tide. It hit you with a rushing deluge of speech the likes of which could drown a fish.

“I admit I was excited to meet you. I’ve been requesting a veterinarian for the station for nearly a year. I can’t tell you how many people have contracted food poisoning from all the uninspected animal products floating around.” Bashir shook his head. “I’d tell everyone to stop eating it, but I admit I get sick of replicated food day in and day out too.”

“Everyone does,” you agreed quickly, trying to relate. Now that you had the flow of the conversation, you started to feel like you could tread water rather than drown in it. “Good thing or I’d be out of a job.”

“This will be good for our research as well. Lieutenant Dax keeps complaining that it takes too long for the FACUC to approve her research protocols. Having a veterinarian here to review them before we send them to the committee should speed up the process somewhat.”

“Nothing I love more than paperwork…” you muttered to yourself. Dr. Bashir seemed to have missed the comment completely. The torrent roared on, battering you from all sides.

“Personally, I find working on all these creatures fascinating,” he remarked. He turned away from you for a second, strolling over to a console. His fingers tapped swiftly, bringing up a map of the station. “I can’t believe how easy it’s been to learn all their different anatomies once you have the basics down. Being on the frontier has really allowed me to showcase my talents.”

“Uh huh,” you said, arms crossing in front of your chest. With his back towards you he managed to miss everything, including your tone.

Bashir turned around to face you, practically beaming like a labrador with a new tennis ball. You felt more like a soaked cat who had barely escaped from the bathtub. Disgruntled, but still trying to play nice, you shook off his words with great distaste. However, what he said next left you close to spitting mad.

“Of course, I don’t have time to take care of every animal on the station. It’ll be nice to have another Doctor to help me out.”

Had you a tail, it would have whipped back and forth with a vicious frenzy. The hairs on the back of your neck prickled as your eyes narrowed. A primordial part of your brain insisted that the correct response was to claw out the good Doctor’s throat. Luckily, your sensible brain won and you settled for a cutting remark instead.

“I’ll try not to get in your way,” you hissed at him through gritted teeth. Bashir blinked at you for a moment, seemingly oblivious to what he had said. A snide remark about his observation skills drifted across your mind. The corner of your lips twitched upwards for just a moment at the thought. You could practically see the light bulb click on above his head when he realized what he’d implied. His russet eyes widened as he backpedaled so fast you thought he might fall over.

“O-oh… I’m sorry. I didn’t mean-”

“No, I’m sure you didn’t,” you returned with a forced smile. Your rage was subsiding, if only because you had thoroughly enjoyed watching him splash about helplessly in his own words. “Perhaps we should start our tour of the station now?”

“Right…” Bashir agreed, grabbing for the conversation change like a Lifesaver. “I assume you read the technical manual?”

“There wasn’t much else to do for the two week trip,” you confirmed. A pleased smile poured out onto Bashir’s lips. It was then you realized you’d, yet again, opened the floodgates. You could barely believe it when you saw the incoming wave of information hurtling towards you.

Just how long could this man keep _talking_?

“No, I suppose not. Well then, as you know, Sickbay has a surgical suite, intensive care ward and the diagnostic and research center we are currently standing in. In addition, there are two non-critical care wards on level thirteen. Also, forty five unattended medical terminals are scattered around the station.” At this point Bashir began pointing things out on the map. You tried desperately to follow along. “There are also some physical therapy suites, a dental care office, an immunological lab, a stereotaxonomy lab, a microgravity research lab, and EM cytology analysis labs scattered around the Mid-Core and Habitat Ring.”

“What about quarantine facilities?” you asked, head swirling with details you’d never remember come morning.

“There aren’t any dedicated biohazard-isolation sections per say. However, we can turn the empty rooms into isolation wards using force fields.”

“Practical,” you commented. It was about as much as you could muster. “All right Doctor, where do we start our tour?”

“Why don’t we start with the non-critical care wards?”

“Sounds fine to me,” you nodded. A weary smile limped its way on your face. “Lead on.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **[1]** From the CDC: “Zoonotic diseases are contagious diseases spread between animals and humans. These diseases are caused by bacteria, viruses, parasites, and fungi that are carried by animals and insects. Examples are anthrax, dengue, Ebola hemorrhagic fever, Escherichia coli infection, Lyme disease, malaria, Plague, Rocky Mountain spotted fever, salmonellosis, and West Nile virus infection. Scientists estimate that more than 6 out of every 10 infectious diseases in humans are spread from animals.” http://www.cdc.gov/24-7/cdcfastfacts/zoonotic.html
> 
> [2]When a civilian doctor is accepted into the military, they are brought it at a prescribed rank. Both human doctors and Veterinarians come in at the rank of "Captain" in the US Army. In Starfleet, those that have an advanced degree, such as an MD or DVM, come in at the rank of Lieutenant.


	3. Dr. Herriot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Story Progress Note:** At this time (2/5/14), I have a rough draft of everything through chapter 12 and a timeline for most of the series. My beta-reader and I are literally writing the book on Cardassian Vole biology and behavior to supplement what we know from the series. As we want to provide a consistent and reasonable picture of these animals, chapters 4, 5, 6, and 12 all need to be written together. We are working hard to get the next chapters tweaked and then we will be posting them. Vet school is a bit crazy right now, so this may take a few weeks. We hope to have them done by the end of Feb.
> 
> Also, **we love all you trekkies**. Thanks for reading! :3

“You know. It never occurred to me just how big this station really was until I had to walk it. I’m starting to think I’m going to spend most of my time getting lost,” you groaned. The dull aching of your calves was occasionally overridden by a sharp pain from the blister on the back of your ankle. 

During your tour, Doctor Bashir subjected you to almost every single medical facility in the station. You were held captive, forced to listen to an never ending monologue of information about his medical career, research and recent tennis matches. You gave him credit, he certainly looked the part of a physically fit athlete. You on, the other hand, were not so fine a specimen. Veterinary medical school called for a lot of sitting in lecture for three years followed by ‘hurry up and wait’ during the year of clinicals. It had been a long time since you had the time to walk long distances. To make up for being locked away for four years, the entire class coped by “stress baking”. An endless stream of homemade cookies, cakes, pastries and pies left your waistline significantly less trim then when you started school. Worse yet, you had failed to break in your standard issue shoes before arrival. You were certainly paying for all these sins now.

“You’ll get used to it rather quickly,” Bashir reassured you. His shoulders back and head up, you couldn’t help but detest how perky he seemed. It was practically offensive that you felt so out of shape and he was so perfectly at home. You resolved to dislike him for it later. Right now, you wanted a sonic shower and a sofa.

“I’m not entirely convinced….” You trailed off as you looked around the Promenade.

While Sickbay was located on the Promenade, Bashir had elected to show you the rest of the station first and save “the best for last”. The lights were significantly brighter here than any of the hallways. The Promenade was made of three floors: five, six and seven. The Level Seven Concourse, the lowest floor, was where most of the shops and food seemed to be. You had already seen the Replimat, a Klingon restaurant and some bar called Quark’s. From what Bashir had explained, it also contained the Security office, a school, and a Bajoran Temple. Level Six was mostly windows and bridges. Level Five, the upper most floor, contained storage space and Quark’s Holosuites. There were people everywhere on the concourse. For a “backwater station”, you could not believe the amount of traffic.

“Here we are.” Bashir headed directly for a little shop near a spiral staircase. It had a double wide, metal door with the same cross hatches that decorated the doors to quarters. 

“What’s so special about this shop?” you asked. The plain front hardly differed from any of the nearby stores. The only thing that made it stand out were the solid metal doors when nearly every other shop had glass. It seemed like a poor marketing tactic.

Bashir smiled at you so patiently you felt your eyebrow twitch in annoyance. The good doctor seemed quite determined to be happy despite your rapidly worsening mood. “I wanted to introduce you to someone. This is his shop.”

You followed the doctor down three steps and through the automatic door way. The shop had the same grey walls with barred designs that you had seen all over the station. Judging from the numerous mannequins in fine clothes, you guessed it was some sort of fashion boutique. Several clothing racks were scattered along the walls with unique outfits hanging from them. On a large central table there was a pile of mixed fabric bolts. A few full length mirrors hung along the walls and made the room seem bigger than it really was. In the back, you could see thick orange drapes and another door. You assumed these might be changing rooms. As you glanced around the shop curiously, a voice from behind you drew your attention.

“ _Ah_ , my dear Doctor! What an _unexpected_ surprise! I was under the impression you would be locked away with your research today.”

You turned to see a grey skinned man stepping out from the back room. The scaly neck ridges and spoon shaped crest upon his forehead immediately identified him as a Cardassian. He wore black slacks, and a dark grey long sleeved shirt under a deep green vest with some sort of textured swirling pattern on it. You noted that he had slicked back black hair and pale blue eyes. All the pictures of Cardassians you had seen during your forty five day Starfleet crash course had brown hair and brown eyes. It surprised you somewhat.

It was clear from the beaming grin on Dr. Bashir’s face that this man was a friend. The doctor walked straight up to the Cardassian and clapped him on the shoulder. During training, you had been told that Cardassians do not like to be touched as a rule. You took the man’s lack of protest to mean that Bashir and he had a somewhat close relationship. You wondered what the shopkeeper and the doctor had in common.

“I was,” Bashir confirmed. He turned and gestured towards you with an open hand. “However, the new officer aboard needed a tour of the station and I needed a break.”

“I see,” the Cardassian acknowledged. Those pale eyes looked you up and down, seemingly sizing you up. You shuffled your feet together and rolled your shoulders back in what you hoped was a subtle manner. By accident, you matched the Cardassian’s stare. The discord between his cordially curious face and the sharp inspection of those icy eyes was eerie. You felt nervous goosebumps go up your forearm. You quickly broke the gaze and focused on Bashir instead. 

“Garak, I’d like to introduce our new veterinarian.” Bashir turned his 1000 watt smirk on you and added: “She’ll be our very own Dr. Doolittle from now on.”

“Who?” Garak inquired politely, turning back to your humanoid compatriot. You sighed with relief the second his scrutiny was somewhere else.

“Dr. Doolittle is a fictional doctor from a 1920s Earth novel. He had the ability to talk to animals,” Bashir explained. You tried not to roll your eyes at the comparison. Dr. Doolittle was a MD, not a DVM. Not to mention, you didn’t really care for his attitude towards humans. However, this did present a good place to join in the conversation.

“I prefer Dr. Herriot,” you chimed in. Both men looked at you for a moment. Garak glanced back and forth between the you two doctors before settling his interest on you.

“Who?” he asked again. This time, his eyes were wider and his stare was not so razor sharp. Feeling significantly less threatened, you smiled nicely and proceeded to answer his question.

“Dr. James Herriot. It is the penname of a veterinarian called Dr. James Wight. He wrote several semi-autobiographical collections of stories about his work as a veterinarian in the 1940s.” You paused for just a moment to chose your next words carefully. Bashir had clearly intended his remarks to be a compliment. There was no point in ripping into the poor man simply because he obviously had never read Dr. Doolittle. “Unlike the Dr. Doolittle series, the Herriot novels are much more realistic. They’re considered a classic historical work amongst many in the medical professions. Obviously, veterinarians in particular have an attachment to them.”

“I see…” the Cardassian repeated. He turned to face Dr. Bashir. “Doctor, I don’t recall you ever mentioning those novels before.” A knowing smile spread across his face. “Keeping secrets are we?” he teased.

“I wouldn’t be the first,” Dr. Bashir replied somewhat bitterly. You saw something unspoken flit between them, but what it was you couldn’t tell. However, as the tension in the room rose, you elected not to inquire. Instead, you looked around for anything to change the conversation to. Among the bolts of fabric, you noticed a creamy, ivory sample piece that seemed to glow under the fluorescent lights. Taking a step toward the table, you reached out and touched the material. As the fabric slipped through your fingers, you realized it was some form of silk.

“I’ve never felt something so soft,” you observed more loudly than necessary. Turning back to the men, you added: “What is this?”

“Ah, you have an excellent eye!” Garak responded, immediately strolling over to the table. You held out the sample and he took it from you gently. His long fingers lifted the cloth up to the ceiling light panels. Under the fluorescent beams it shimmered as if it were made of pure magic. As you observed the cloth with wonder, Garak continued: “ _This_ is silk from Kraus IV. It is second only to Tholian silk which is nigh impossible to obtain. I am working on a gown for a customer with very fine taste. I’ve just ordered the bolt for her.”

“Oh!” you said, the realization finally hitting you. You looked around the store with eyes significantly wider than before. You tried to count up all the completed outfits you could see and came to a number well over forty. Each was perfectly matched and beautifully pressed. You suspected that the craftsmanship would be even more impressive up close. “Then… you made all of these?”

You delivered another mental kick to yourself. Thank you, Captain Obvious.

“That is the job of a tailor,” Garak remarked, looking mildly amused. He caught your eye and grinned before gesturing to his collection. “Do you see anything that piques your interest?”

Your attention was immediately drawn to a long, off-shoulder dress hanging on a rack in the back section of the shop. It was made of a thick aqua colored taffeta. The dress was a sheath style and had horizontal pintucks running down the waist and hips. 

“The turquoise one in the back…” You trailed off. The dress did interest you, but not as a customer. Something about it struck you as very strange. You looked at the other pieces, trying to spot the difference. Many of the other suits and dresses were more covering, particularly about the neck. It was then that you recalled the optional “Species Relations” seminar from basic training. Finally, you realized why the dress was so out of place. “Isn’t that a bit risqué for a Cardassian dress?”

In your peripheral vision, you caught sight of Bashir’s face. His head was cocked slightly to the side with one eyebrow lifted. The expression reminded you of a quizzical Labrador Retriever. His eyes flited between you and Garak as if he was watching a Tennis match. Far from Bashir’s confusion, Garak seemed quite pleased at your observation. 

“That is also a commissioned piece for a young Ensign,” he explained. “As a tailor, it is my job to keep abreast of all the latest fashions, not just those on my homeworld. After all, my primary customers are Bajoran and Federation citizens.”

“Always good to cater to the market,” you agreed. The statement left nowhere for the discussion to go. You quickly tried to come up with a question from which you could build. However, before you could so much as think, Garak beat you to it.

“So Doctor, what _are_ your duties on this station?” Garak inquired. 

You were impressed. The Cardassian moved the introduction along like a mother cat her ushering kittens. The continuation was so seamless that only someone practiced in the art of conversation could have executed it. Clearly, Garak was a talker. You guessed this is why he and Bashir got along so well.

It took you a moment to decide how to describe your job. Your occupation had so many facets that simplification would be difficult. Thinking about it further, you realized you really need not worry. Anyone who could enjoy Bashir’s endless conversations could surely deal with a long winded explanation of your profession. 

“I have a variety of duties...” you started slowly. You examined Garak’s face for signs of satisfaction or disinterest. His eyes met yours expectantly, brow ridges attentively raised as if to coax you onward. When it was clear that he wanted a more detailed explanation, you let the walls come down. “I am here to conduct animal product and livestock inspection for any ship with plans of selling on DS9. I also will be doing travel paperwork and health inspections of animals that will be traveling into Federation space. In addition, I’ll be reviewing any laboratory protocols that involve animals in research.”

“I assume you’ll also be taking care of Ensign Whittaker’s dog?” Garak surmised. You blinked at him in bewilderment.

“Dog?” you questioned. A warm feeling swelled in your core, rising like bread in an oven. Your heart lept forward a beat, threatening to dance its way out of your chest. Pictures of the silky, pampered pets you had tended in medical school frolicked about in your brain. On the heels of this fancy came fantasies of colorful birds, sleek lizards and small fluffy puff balls clutched lovingly in the arms of their owners. You envisioned yourself like a fairy tale princess, surrounded by all the friendly creatures of the alpha quadrant. In your mind, you tenderly bandaged their paws while adoringly stroking their soft, furry heads. Slowly, you turned to Dr. Bashir, a glowing aura of hope all around you. “There is a dog on the station?”

“His name is Gunner...” Bashir offered slowly. The confused puppy look had converted into full on apprehension at your suddenly strange behavior. He turned his body slightly away from you, staring at you out of the the corner of his vision. “You mean you didn’t know that people had pets on the station?”

The giant smile and starry-eyed look plastered across your face told everyone more than enough to draw their own conclusions. You were too lost in your daydreams of general practice to answer the question.

“There are also Buttons and Baubles…” Bashir related. 

“ **Who?** ” you managed to squeak out. Your whole body hummed. More animals? It was difficult not to explode with elation.

“They are two Siamese cats that belong to Ensign Walker,” Bashir explained. “I’ve examined them before. Buttons is rather terrified of being touched by strangers.”

“And Baubles?” you demanded with great excitement.

Perhaps it was the lighting, but Bashir’s face looked much more pale. He brought his left hand to his neck, rubbing gently along the prominence of his spine. His upper lip curled up just the tiniest bit on the left side. His eyes looked over his shoulder warily, as if he were waiting for something to attack him. 

Garak, by contrast, seemed thoroughly entertained by your rabid enthusiasm. You received a particularly indulgent look before he rolled his head over to observe the other doctor. His smile changed to a thin lipped, all knowing smirk as he tilted his head coyly at Bashir. Bashir returned the expression with eyebrows knitted and a particularly grim frown on his countenance.

“I guess we had better go find Ensign Whittaker,” he concluded, walking towards the door. His gate was faster and stiffer than usual. It reminded you of a dog trying to sneak off with a stolen meatball. Not even this sudden change in behavior could pull you out of your own personal Wonderland. You trailed behind him, positively enthralled. When you both reached the threshold, he turned back to face Garak. You noted that his face looked a bit more colored. His muscles seemed less tight than before. “We’re still on for lunch tomorrow, correct?”

“I look forward to it as always,” Garak replied, his smug air still very much in place. You whipped around to face the shopkeeper, fighting down an embarrassed flush. You finally remembered your manners but you wished they had come to you sooner.

“It was very nice to meet you, Mr. Garak,” you stated with a polite bow. 

Garak returned the gesture with a slight nod of the head and a sharp grin .“Oh, it’s just Garak. Plain, simple, Garak,” he remarked.

“Okay... Garak then,” you repeated. You found his grin welcoming, but off putting at the same time. “I’ll remember that.” 

The doors to the Promenade whispered open behind you. You turned again, following Bashir back up the stairs towards the crowded concourse. It seemed like even more people were present than previously. Just as you reached the top step, a voice from behind caught your attention.

“Good bye, Dr. Herriot,” Garak called as the doors slipped closed behind you. You were surprised enough to stop moving until your companion snapped you out of it.

“It appears you have a nickname,” Bashir noted. His expression had finally returned to the calm contentment you associated with him. His joy was contagious and you soon felt quite pleased yourself. Cheerfully, you followed him through the promenade. 

“You think so, ‘ _my dear Doctor_ ’?” you commented, dodging around a young couple. 

Bashir seemed very happy to ignore your comeback. He continued forward, heading for the Sickbay. Ducking to the left, you avoided a Bolian crewman who was practically sprinting down the concourse. A gruff call of “no running on the promenade!” came from somewhere beyond your vision. At this, the Bolian slowed to a brisk walk. Finally, you reached the entrance to the medical ward. Once inside, Bashir shot you a questioning look.

“And what was that comment about risqué fashion?” he asked.

“Oh, the dress…” you half-laughed. You pushed a clump of hair behind your ear and smiled at the doctor. “Didn’t you go to the “Species Relations” lecture during Starfleet training?”

“We didn’t talk about the Cardassians during the lecture two years ago. There was no treaty with them at that time,” Bashir pointed out.

“Well... Cardassian fashion is rather conservative,” you explained. You could still picture the more traditional clothing in Garak’s shop. It matched every photo you had seen in the presentation. “We were told that, if we expected to be around a Cardassian, we should chose a shirt with a high neckline.”

“Yes, but any particular reason?” Bashir inquired, his hands gesturing you onward.

You shrugged at the tall brunette. “None that they mentioned. Though, I suppose you could ask Garak if you really had to know.”

Bashir snorted loudly at your suggestion. You shot him a puzzled look.

“Something I said?”

Bashir shook his head. His pouty lips and furrowed brows practically screamed annoyance. You wondered what you had done for a moment before you realized the emotion wasn’t directed at you. The good doctor didn’t seem to be forthcoming with an explanation. Ducking into his gaze, you spun your hands around each other in the international gesture of ‘please go on’. He sighed heavily and made a motion akin to throwing his hands up.

“You’ll see if you ever try to ask him a question,” Bashir assured. “The man is so damned _evasive_ you’d be lucky to get the time of day out of him.”

“If you don’t like it, why are you friends with him?” you pointed out.

“I don’t know that we are friends,” Bashir admitted. “We meet for lunch, but he never tells me a damn thing about himself. I’m sure you noticed it too. He got a whole bunch of information out of you, but barely gave you anything in return.”

Eyes rolling upward, you thought back to the conversation. It had seemed like a relatively equal exchange, but you did recall he beat you to several questions. In fact, all you knew about him was that he was friendly to Bashir and he was a tailor. Perhaps that is what the doctor was talking about.

“He’s good at asking questions,” you mentioned. “I noticed that.”

“He’s a spy,” Bashir declared.

“Wha-what? Seriously?” you burst out. You felt the color drain from your face at the unexpected revelation. “I thought he was a tailor?”

“Oh, that’s what he’ll _tell_ you,” Bashir explained bitterly, walking over to a chair. He threw himself in it and continued to pout. “Everybody on this station knows he’s a spy, but he refuses to admit it.”

“Oh…” you murmured. You felt a wave of apprehension rise in your stomach. Suddenly, the goosebumps you had felt earlier made perfect sense. “Should I not have told him about my job then?”

“No, I don’t think it’ll cause a problem...” Bashir reassured. He gestured for you to take the other seat. You walked over to it, rolled it closer and sat down. He rested his elbows on his knees, folding his hands across his face. “There’s nothing you told him that he couldn’t figure out by himself.”

“I feel kinda stupid about the whole thing,” you admitted, staring down into your lap. “What if I had said something I wasn’t supposed to?” Raising a hand to your mouth, you gently bit a fingernail. As soon as you realized what you were doing, you interlocked your hands and looked up at Bashir. “I mean, what do I do if he talks to me again?”

Bashir smiled sympathetically at you. “At this point, I’ve learned to just talk to him like he’s a normal person.” Shifting in his chair, he shot you a serious look. “Obviously, don’t go divulging things you hear at officer’s meetings.”

You nodded vigorously. Bashir’s smile broke into a chuckle. In your head, you could see a happily thumping tail stretched out behind him. The image was too cute. You returned the laugh with a sheepish smile.

“I wouldn’t worry too much. If I really thought he was dangerous, I wouldn’t have introduced the two of you,” Bashir pointed out.

“Right,” you agreed, feeling rather silly.

Bashir leaned back in the chair, stretching his arms out. He stifled a yawn and glanced over at the clock on the wall. You followed his gaze. It read 1600. You wondered how the day disappeared so fast.

“Well,” he cut in with a boyish grin. “I believe I promised you a dog. Whittaker and Gunner ought to be going out for their afternoon walk shortly. What do you say we try to track them down?”

“Yes please!” you exclaimed, practically leaping from your seat. Pure unadulterated joy coursed through you as you speculated what Gunner would look like. Floppy ears? Curly tail? Fluffy fur? Oh, anything was already too good to be true! You fixed your companion with an overly eager and grateful grin. “Thank you so much for doing all this for me, Dr. Bashir!”

Suddenly, you stopped cold. It occurred to you that he had been working on his paper before you came along. Here you were all wrapped up in a dog and you had sucked up your colleague's entire day. Your grin instantly faded into a worried frown. “...but don’t you have to get back to your work?”

Bashir waved a hand at you dismissively. “It’ll keep for another hour.” Giving you one more glittering smile, he added: “...and please, call me, Julian.”


	4. To War

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Author's Comments:** We are now descending into what I lovingly call "Birth of the Vole Master" arc. The grand scheme to deal with the voles on DS9 will last through at least chapter 12 and features prominently in future developments of this story. I've watched all of the show save for the series finale and never found any specific mention of how they dealt with the Cardassian voles. I started speculating that there was no way O'Brien could have handled something like that by just shooting them and formulated a more "reasonable" plan which became the basis of this story. ~~I was tried of studying and this was WAY more fun to write at midnight before an exam.~~  
>  Please note that Star Trek was written by writers, not scientists. As such, they made scientific leaps in 15 min that should have taken months in committee. I've tried to compromise and make the process somewhat more realistic (FACUC protocols, habitat design, behavioral care etc). However, since the cannon calls for "dues ex machina medicine", you can expect some very unrealistic things (making a new drug in one night) to take place. Real medical research would never go down this fast, but at least I'm doing one better than "look at this new drug I made in two min! Let's give it and magical cures happen! [insert sunshine and rainbows here]". May the gods of realism in writing forgive me.

It had not taken long for the drudgery of work to overwhelm the giddiness you experience from meeting Gunner the Keeshound. You felt rather stupid when, in the first five seconds of meeting them, Ensign Whittaker corrected your pronunciation. It turns out the breed was "kays-hund" not "keys-hound". Good thing you'd gone to school all those years to sound so uneducated. Though he helped, even a walking puff ball of love like Gunner wasn’t enough to make you forget the vole problem. You were still at a loss about what to recommend. You hoped that you could find something in the veterinary database, otherwise you were in trouble.

As the door to your quarters opened, Joannah came flying across the room in a sinuosus bolt. You quickly darted inside, cutting her off. When the door slid shut, you breathed a heavy sigh of relief. Joannah craned her neck and flicked her tongue at you. You shook your head at the lizard.

“Why in the world do you try to door dash, Joannah? You don’t even like strangers!”

With another tongue flick, she crawled over to you and settled at your feet. You kneeled down beside her, reaching slowly for her neck without looming over her. Gently, you scratched along her chin. She seemed to lean into the touch a bit.

You loved that Joannah was so attached to you. From what you had read in history texts, her species used to be wild in the 20th century. The old Savannah Monitors were owned as pets, but did not actively seek human companionship. They required months of taming and socialization to be touched. However, hundreds of years of selective breeding and domestication created a lizard that was as friendly as a cuddly cat. You made sure your girl was exposed to many different sights, sounds, environments, and all the handling you could manage when she was a young lizard. Despite your best attempts at socialization, Joannah was still rather territorial and would attack strangers out of fear. Luckily, she usually froze when an unknown person came in. It gave you time to gather her up. It simply would not do to have your pet tailwhip your guests.

All of a sudden Joannah’s head raised up alertly. Her forked tongue thrust wildly into the air. She lifted herself to her feet and began to slowly creep over towards your replicator. You watched the swaying walk curiously. She looked like she was stalking something.

“What is it Joannah?” you asked, rising to your feet. Joannah ignored you and continued to follow some unknown smell. When she finally reached the replicator, she cocked her head at it and flicked her tongue one more time. Then, she began to push on the access panel with her nose. “I know you’re smart girl, but I doubt you can work that,” you said with a laugh.

All of a sudden, the lights flickered and a puff of foul smoke seeped out of the compartment. Joannah’s tongue went crazy, dancing like a piece of tissue in the breeze. You waved a hand in front of your face and coughed. As a few sparks spurted from the mechanical device, you stared at your pet in horror.

“Computer: turn on the vent and cut power to the replicator!” you commanded, leaping over to Joannah’s position. Eyes burning, you side scooped under Joannah’s neck and made a ring grip around it. You rested the remainder of her body on your forearm. Your other hand supported between her back legs. “Oh no you don’t! No cooked lizard tonight!” 

Calmly, but quickly, you placed Joannah in the bathroom and shut the door behind you. Then, you swiftly returned to the replicator and began to remove the access panel. The stench hit you like a punch to the gut. You choked on the smell of burnt flesh as you looked deep into the chasm of electronics. In the back, you could see chewed wires and a clump of beige fur. You knew instantly that Sisko’s “little” vole problem was much bigger than your realized. Your hand reached up and tapped the communicator on your lapel.

“Engineering: I’d like to report a replicator malfunction,” you half coughed into the line.

The commline was silent for a moment, before a brisk Irish accent replied: “This is O’Brien. Where’s the malfunction?”

“Crew quarters: H-3, Chamber 892,” you explained. “I think one of those stupid voles got fried. There are some broken wires and it smells like death.” 

You heard vigorous cursing come over the line. It seemed that whoever you were speaking to felt even less love for the voles than Sisko.

“Wait a minute... H-3 892? You’re the new vet right?”

“How did you know that?”

“I’m the one who just got the replicator working in your room yesterday!” O’Brien complained. “You’re telling me those damn Cardy Voles already damaged it?”

You were too shocked to call out the racial slur. Clearly, Mr. O’Brien was having a worse day than you were. With a frustrated sigh, you explained: “It started smoking and sparking not three minutes ago. I cut the power so it wouldn’t burn my quarters down.”

More cursing erupted over the commline. You tried your best not to laugh. You hadn’t thought anyone could be more unhappy about their job on this station than you. Now, you felt like you got off easy. “I’ll get someone up to you as soon as I can Doc,” O’Brien promised. “I’ve got force fields down in the security office and power losses on one of the docking pylons.”

“Where am I going to get food in the mean time?” you asked. Now that Joannah was up and moving again, you wanted to get her fed as soon as possible. 

“You’ll have to use the Replimat for now. Until we can get these damn voles under control, nothing is safe on this station,” O’Brien groaned. “By the way, Commander Sisko said you were working on the pest problem. Any ideas yet?”

“Not yet,” you admitted, a pang of guilt crawling up your throat. “but I have an idea where to start.”

O’Briens laughter sounded as uneasy as it did exhausted. “Well whatever plan you come up with Doc, I just hope it works. We’ve got six weeks until their breeding season starts and everybody around here is already sick of them.”

“I’ll do my best. Vet out,” you acknowledged as diplomatically as you could. The revelation of the new deadline made you feel even more defeated. You closed up the replicator and made your way to the door. “At least I know where to FIND the Replimat now.”

 

 

About a half hour later, you returned from the Promenade with a sandwich for yourself and a quarter cup of wiggling gagh for your pet. You set down your own plate first and made sure to coat Johannah’s meal with some Calcium/D3 powder you had brought from Earth. Joannah seemed less than pleased when you released her from the bathroom. She blinked at you and sauntered on by as if to say ‘about time’. However, as soon as she tasted the smell of dinner in the air, you were forgiven. Moving quickly, so she wouldn’t have time to climb your pant leg, you set the plate of worms on the floor for her. She primly meandered her way over to the offering and stuck out her tongue again. Joannah reached out and snapped up one of the wriggling creatures in her toothy jaws. The first gagh went down in three rapid gulps followed by another tasting of the air around her prey. Three worms later, Joannah left to get a drink. You took the rest of the gagh and put it in the food recycler. You certainly weren’t going to eat it

“Computer: dim the lights,” you stated, plopping down at the computer console.

Over the next two hours you rounded up as much information as you could find on Cardassian voles. It soon became very clear that they were not a well-known species. In fact, no in the Federation had ever conducted a study on them. It didn’t shock you. The Cardassian government was reluctant to share information of any kind. The best data was gathered by Dr. Phlox, Chief Medical Officer aboard the Enterprise, in 2155. You recognized the name immediately. The Denobulan was famous in your profession. A true medical genius, he was a humanoid doctor and possessed six degrees in Interspecies Veterinary Medicine.

During his career, Dr. Phlox collected anecdotal reports about the voles. Most of the information came from traders whose ships were infested after business dealings with the Cardassians. Through his contacts, Phlox was able to obtain vole nests and corpses for further study. He made a few passing mentions of Tribbles catching “Vole Fever” but no humanoid zoonoses were noted. For that, you were very glad. The photos he provided showed six legged creatures that were about half the size of Joannah. Just in case you didn’t know which planet the voles called home, they were conveniently decorated with the same spoon shaped crest you’d seen on Garak’s forehead. They had very little hair, warts all over their backs, bat like ears, and wrinkled faces that were so ugly you wanted to hug one. 

Within thirty minutes, you understood Dr. Phlox’s fascination with the creatures. Cardassian voles were both similar and different to Terran mice. They thrived in the cargo bays of ships where it was quiet and dark. Their voracious appetite for electrocution was so well documented that one frustrated Captain called them: “the Cardassian curse”. 

From the traders’ stories, Dr. Phlox determined the voles only lived six months under the best conditions. While they mated only once in their short lives, the creatures were known to “breed like Tribbles”; they produced an average of fifteen babies per litter. Thanks to their exponential reproduction and lack of predators, starship vole populations could get out of control despite their limited lifespan. Dr. Phlox concluded that, if the voles ever got onto a Starbase, they would be nearly impossible to get rid of. 

Well… fuck...

As for the animals themselves, they were omnivorous and primarily scavengers. Voles only did two things with their short lives: eat and protect their nest. Unlike Terran rodents, Cardassian voles did not hoard foodstuffs because it might lead predators back to the young. The voles only defecated in communal areas which were far from their dens. The mothers even ate the feces of their kits to keep the nest odor free. When a vole died, the nearest mother vole would eat the carcass. This had a twofold benefit: it provided an energy source for lactation and prevented detection by predators. You shuddered at the thought; if the voles were cannibalistic, it made it much easier for them to pass disease from one to the next. Free of zoonoses or not, they had the potential to spread epidemics if the wrong pathogen got into them.

They had to go.

You felt a familiar pressure building below your temporal bone. It spread down the side of your neck and into the front of your forehead. Just what you needed, a headache to improve your mood.

“I should have just been a stripper like Alna,” you moaned, resting your head on the desk. Alna, your one woman circus of an older sister, was now a happily married self-defense instructor at Starfleet Academy. However, in her wilder youth, she had explored many job options. She could probably hook you up with her old friends if you really needed a career change. You were very seriously considering platform boots when you felt a sharp pain on your leg. You looked down, only to see Joannah climbing up your pants. Looking at your pet wearily, you said: “You’re distracting me, sweetie.” 

Your words had no effect on Joannah’s actions. She simply continued to climb. You sighed and picked up your lizard before she could tear another hole in your uniform. She closed her eyes the moment she was in your arms, snuggling against the warmth of your chest. Surrendering to scaley temptation, you and your beloved pet relocated to the couch. You lay down and allowed her to rest on your torso. She propped her head across your left breast, quite content. You languidly stroked her scales and closed your eyes to think about vole population control. 

 

 

You awoke on the couch, curled on your side. Rubbing your eyes sleepily, you rasped: “Computer: time?”

“The time is 2200 hours.”

You reached for Joannah, but she was nowhere to be seen. You were unfazed; she was far too big and agile for you to squash. Your bladder ached, calling you to find a bathroom. Lifting yourself off the sofa, you planted your foot onto the ground.

 _SQUISH_ **CRACK** _guuuurggle poppoppop_

The sudden feeling of warm, gooey.... _something_ all over your foot, ripped you out of your sleepy state. 

“Computer: lights!” you croaked. 

As the room brightened, you stared in horror at your foot. The warm squishy feeling between your toes was the smashed entrails of a Cardassian vole. You could still make out the small intestines and fragments of rib cage beneath your sole. Fluid the color of chocolate milk oozed around your ankle. You gagged on bile. Then, a terrifying thought struck you.

Where _was_ Joannah? 

Your head twisted towards Joannah’s largest hide so fast that you felt whiplash. Sure enough, right beside the couch, Joannah was perched ever so prettily with a second dead vole between her legs. Daintly, she tore another hunk of flesh off her kill.

“JOANNAH, NO!” you shrieked, leaning over to snatch the meat away from her. It was too late. Joannah bolted the food with a faint gulping noise. Your fingers twitched in the air as you moaned: “I just dewormed you a week ago!”

With no other recourse, you decided the carcass removal could wait. Hopping on your clean foot, you bounced over to the bathroom. The warm water and soap couldn’t wash away the nausea you felt. As a veterinarian, you saw your fair share of things that would make the average person vomit. Like all medical professionals, dark humor and embracing the vile often helped you adjust effectively. This case was the exception. There was no coping with unanticipated gore.

Foot still wet, you walked back to the living room. You judiciously avoided the spots of vole juice on the carpet as you hurried to your pet. Within seconds, Joannah was in your arms. You carried her back to the bathroom, shut the door and set upon wiping the vole off her. After a few swipes of your washcloth, it became very apparent that Joannah had not escaped unscathed. There were large scratches on her neck and underbelly, one of which was a full centimetre deep. Joannah was not pleased with your ministrations and tried to claw her way out of the soapy sink. 

By the time you finished cleaning her, your entire bathroom and most of your uniform had been sloshed with bath water. Joannah’s frantic flailing left you with scratches on your arms and small holes in your uniform. Lips fixed in a firm line, you deftly carried your poor injured baby to your standard issue medkit. 

“This is exactly why I don’t feed you live mammals, Joannah,” you explained to her patiently. Joannah seemed to take your lecture in stride now that she was no longer covered in bathwater. Using the dermal regenerator, you worked magic on your lizard. The glossy gold scales of her underbelly were instantly restored. “Look at how beat up you got!” You examined the rest of her body, healing any nicks you could see. “What if that nasty vole had something? What if you got infected?” Shuddering at the thought, you broke out the medical tricorder. A full scan revealed no abnormal findings. You hoped the impromptu bath did the trick.

You looked from her to the dead voles near your couch and back again. “And I suppose you were trying to teach me to hunt, hmmm?” you demanded. For her part, Joannah seemed wholly unrepentant. She flicked her tongue at you and blinked her large golden eyes. You shook your head and continued with the lecture: “Look darling, it’s not that I’m not proud that you can still kill your own food, but this is the 24th century. We don’t do things like that anymore. The food comes pre-killed.”

Joannah just cocked her head at you and attempted to crawl up your jacket. You couldn’t help but laugh in frustration. With an indulgent smile at your sweet little girl, you concluded: “All right, I get it. You were just doing what you had to. I suppose it’s time I did my job too.”

Picking your lizard up, you walked past the two dead voles and placed her in your bedroom. The door closed softly and you turned to survey the mess. Joannah’s largest hide needed to be disinfected, the carpet required a deep scrub, and the water covered bathroom had to be cleaned up. The worst part was, you didn’t even have a trash bag to put the carcasses in. Hands clenched into white knuckled fists, you glowered at the dead creatures. From the look you gave them, you half expected them to burst into flames.

“Okay voles...” you whispered angrily. Your fury sharpened your memory like a Klingon bat’leth. Ideas for population control pelted you like a hail of inspiration. A simple plan wouldn’t do. The voles were too numerous. You’d have to hit them from every side, wearing down their numbers until you could round up every last one and boot them off the station. This situation called for a multipronged attack and you certainly had one in mind. Storming over to your computer, you called up a word processing program. Your fingers danced across the keypad, tapping along with song of madness in your soul. Eyes afire and adrenaline pumping, you needed no sleep tonight.

This wasn’t about control anymore. This was full scale war. 

When Commander Sisko came on duty tomorrow morning, you would be prepared for battle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **Bonus** :Geckomama has risen to the occasion yet again with some lovely (safe for children) fanart for this chapter![ Joannah VS the Vole](http://i1304.photobucket.com/albums/s525/Alldoctorswornandweary/1468643_10101726663923542_1532125027_n_zpsdd68bf33.jpg)


	5. Dead is Fine

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Why isn't there any romance yet?** : One of our goals is to give you (the reader) a life on DS9. Just as real life doesn't revolve around solely around your love interest, this fanfiction will have many chapters which feature your life and friendships, not romance. You're fascinating in your own right ~~we know you're fascinating because you joined our secret little club and read this fanfiction~~ and we want to give you the opportunity to have an adventure all your own. That said, the farther in we get, the more romance (both good and bad) will be involved. For you smut lovers (like me), you will need to wait until season 6 before we really get going. I just wanted to let you know in advance. :3

“Raktajino, black, double strength,” you rasped at the replicator. It buzzed to life with a blue glow, creating the Klingon coffee with a magic the writers of fairy tales only dreamed about. Right hand shaking weakly, you gripped the mug tightly in your palm. The warmth wove its way into your aching fingers like a healing enchantment, banishing the carpal tunnel of your night’s work. You purred with ecstasy as the bitter drink to burn its way down your throat. Cup in hand, you returned to a nearby table where you had laid your things. Despite the fact that part of your tongue was now scalded, you took another swig of the drink. Never had pain felt so deliciously invigorating.

As you seated yourself the other inhabitants of the Replimat, few though they may have been, cast strange looks at the semi-transparent plastic bag near your chair. You had pilfered the white disposal bag from Sickbay sometime in the wee hours of the morning along with a holoscanner tool. After cataloging the voles’ anatomy for future reference, you filled the bag with Joannah’s deceased quarry. Their entrails refused to stay inside the eviscerated carcasses, so the bag quickly became a slurry of vole organs and intestinal fluids. Only the vole from your wall remained intact, and even he was looking gangrenous and bloated. At first you had wished the bag was more opaque; now you were just thankful it wasn’t clear. After all, if people realized what the liquid was, you doubted you’d be allowed to stay in the Replimat to finish your drink.

Within three minutes, you chugged the rest of your coffee and stood up solemnly. You grabbed the bag from the floor, letting its contents slosh as it swayed from your hand. Recycling the coffee cup, you gathered all your PADDs and made your way out into the Promenade. The bag in your left hand swung to and fro, its contents splashing with your slow, plodding walk. A Bajoren security agent gave the container a very pointed stare. You met his frown with an exhausted smirk.

“I assure you they are quiet dead,” you explained, holding your group of ex-voles aloft. The man inspected the container for a moment longer before recognizing the dark brown-red liquid that rolled within the plastic folds. Blanching, he waved you on. You smiled to yourself, happily carrying Joannah’s vole victims to the Turbolift. You hummed some unknown tune, continuing to ignore the shocked expressions on the faces of the passers-by. Whispers flew behind your back, but you could not have cared less.

Let them talk. Today, the end of the voles was nigh.

 

Sleepless and well caffeinated, you arrived in Ops at 0800 sharp. You could feel the eyes of every staff member in the room following you all the way to the commander’s door. Using your elbow, you tapped the chime and stood patiently outside the office. Sisko looked up from his paperwork and saw you waiting through the door’s yellow tinted glass. With a wave of his hand, he beckoned you in.

The commander’s office was one of the grander rooms on the station. In keeping with the circular shape of Ops, the outer wall of the office was curved in an outward arch. On the right was a leather sofa and chair set. To your left was a circular view screen and long shelving unit, decorated with a few nicknacks. Directly in front of the doors was the commander’s impressive desk. The triangular table had a glossy black top with glowing blue accents built into the surface. At nearly two meters wide, it was easily the largest piece of furniture in the room. Behind the desk was an even more magnificent elliptical window. You likened it to a great eye, forever staring at the stars. 

As you entered the room, Sisko raised an eyebrow at your deranged smirk. It didn’t surprise you. You suspected you looked half mad. “What’s in the bag, Doctor?” he asked suspiciously, leaning back in his chair.

“A few samples of your ‘little’ vole problem,” you explained, setting the bag on his desk. You glared at it before turning a strained smile to Sisko. “My pet killed two of them last night. My replicator fried a third. It took me an hour to dig it out of the wall.”

Sisko was somewhat slack jawed with disbelief. As he lifted the bag, the contents sloshed. He glanced from the container to you in silent disbelief. Delicately, he held the bag at arms length and deposited it in the small trashcan beside his desk.

“The good news is, I have the solution to your voles, Commander,” you stated firmly, locking your arms by your side. There was no ‘I think’ or ‘possible’ about it. Your plan was pure evil genius of the cackling variety. It would work. Failure was inconceivable.

You held out all four PADDs to Sisko and he took them cautiously. The devices contained your battle strategy, a draft of your FACUC protocol, a summary of Cardassian vole behavior/biology, and your ‘weapon’ designs. Sisko set the bottom three PADDs down on the desk and began to flip through your tactical plan. His dark eyes scanned the step by step process with great care. You stood at attention, watching his face for any sign of emotion.

The proposed plan was a very long and drawn out process. Rather than simply shooting the voles, you recommended a multimodal approach based on their territorial behavior. Using data from Joannah’s victims, you had modified a rodent birth control compound to work in their species. Your plan was to lace a highly palatable food with the drug, and drop birth control “bait lines” in certain sections of the station. The areas you selected were the most valuable territories a vole could possess: quiet, dark and hard for people to access. To attract the voles to your bait lines, you planed to use electromagnetic field generators. When the voles who consumed the drug died old and kitless, voles from populated areas would move into the more desirable territory. Then the process would start all over again.

Sisko spent a solid three minutes scanning through your proposal before a look of realization crossed his face. He quickly flipped to the second PADD, examining the chemical structure you’d modified during your insomnia. “This is excellent, Doctor,” he praised. “Chief O’Brien will be very greatful if this works.”

“Thank you,” you returned, self-satisfaction plastered across your face. You cast an exhausted glance at the garbage before looking back at your commanding officer. “I was very motivated last night.”

“I can imagine,” Sisko agreed with a paternalistic grin. “What do you need to test the birth control compound?”

While you would have liked to practice “Frontier Medicine” and drop the bait lines right away, Federation law was very clear. Using an experimental drug was only permitted when all approved treatments failed a terminally ill patient. There was no way you could use a novel drug in healthy animals until you could prove it was safe, effective and humane. Even though the goal was extermination, you needed to run multiple simulations and start a drug trial before giving the birth control to the feral scourge of DS9. As long as the initial results matched your simulations, it was likely that you could still drop the bait lines in time for the breeding season **[1]**.

“I ran a simulation this morning using scans off of these three," you told the commander, gesturing to the dead bodies. "It looked promising. For now, I need ten voles of mixed genders that we can scan onto the holodeck.”

“Why do you need both genders? It says in here that the drug is targeting the females only,” Sisko pointed out.

“If one of the males eats the bait, we need to be sure the drug won’t harm them,” you explained. 

“That makes sense.” Sisko stroked his chin thoughtfully. “Do you need them alive?”

The word “alive” hit you harder than you hoped it would. Stomach tightening, you cast your eyes down and focused on the grey carpet. By using the birth control method, the voles would die out naturally. However, there was no way to effectively bait the entire station. Your plan included provisions to shoot any vole found away from the bait lines. Essentially, the phaser fire would serve as a “predator” encouraging the voles to move towards the bait lines. Logically, you understood that death by phaser would be quick and painless. However, killing a healthy animal, even vermin, still made you uncomfortable. You justified your actions by remembering that, if your plan was unsuccessful, the voles would be shot anyways. Your protocol was a much kinder solution than had ever been presented. 

Quashing your concerns, you lifted your head and stared right at Commander Sisko. “No,” you stated definitively. “I have no enclosures to keep them in at this point and we can’t very well re-release them. Besides, we will need different animals to test the drug on; we must maximize genetic variance in the drug trial and the best way to do that is to have more voles.”

The moment the words left your mouth, you felt like Sisko could see straight into your soul. It took all your mental fortitude to hold his gaze. The queasy sickness that came over you strongly reminded you of your first surgery; the stress had nearly made you vomit into your spay incision. At present, your eyes felt itchy and dry as you tried to remember how to blink. After a few anxiety provoking seconds, the commander smiled at you and nodded his head. 

“Understood,” he replied, crossing his arms. “What happens after you scan the voles?”

You swallowed, fighting a horrific case of cotton mouth. “Once I scan the voles in, I will need to extrapolate genetic variance to create a large enough sample size. With simulated diversity in the holovole population, I can run an accurate drug trial simulation. Using the data from the simulation, I will apply for permission to run a drug trial in live voles.” You pointed at one of the two untouched PADDs. “I have the FACUC protocol mostly drafted, but I want someone to look it over before I send it off.”

Writing an FACUC protocol was a task in and of itself. In addition to all the experimental procedures and documentation, the protocol needed to include: what you would feed the voles, how they would be housed, and a detailed explanation of how you would enrich their environment. You had to prove to the FACUC that the voles in your study would have all their physical, behavioral, and intellectual needs met until the end of their six month life. 

Unfortunately, Dr. Phlox left no hints of what to feed the voles. As such, you had made an educated guess based on reports of what the voles liked to steal from cargobays. Hoping they were similar enough to Earth’s rodents, you selected a rodent pellet as their base foodstuff. Since they were scavengers, you also made provisions for whole dead prey and vegetable matter to round out the diet.

Since there was little information on normal vole life, you were forced to extrapolate much of your enrichment strategy from knowledge of Terran mice. To encourage natural scavenging behavior, you planned to provide all food inside of closed cardboard tubes or puzzle toys. This would force the voles to ‘hunt’ for their food. Plastic hides would give the voles a place to feel secure. Roll cotton and shredded paper could be used for nesting and burrowing materials. Like other rodent species, the voles had continuously growing incisors that needed to be worn down. Conveniently, the bones of the whole prey would provide something for the voles to gnaw on.

As for the enclosure designs… you were still working on that.

Sisko shifted in his seat, picking up the PADD you singled out. He glanced through the first paragraph of your draft. “I’ll contact Dax and Bashir," he said, scrolling further down the page. “Dax should also be able to help you with the protocols and I’m sure Bashir can calculate the genetic variances.”

Eyes wide, you shook your head vigorously. “I don’t want to pull anybody off of their own research,” you protested.

Without even looking up, Sisko waved off your concern. “A few days ago, the voles ate through a containment field in the science lab. It nearly resulted in this station being destroyed.” The commander set down the PADD and leaned on his desk. You froze as he looked you in the eye. “Getting rid of them is top priority.”

At that revelation, you relented. You couldn’t imagine what would happen if the voles destroyed a containment field while you were quarantining a sick animal. Oh God, the paperwork….

“Even if the simulations look good, the protocol will take at least a week and a half to be approved,” you explained, twiddling your thumbs. “I just hope we can get fast-tracked given the impending situation. We’ve only got six weeks.”

“I can pull some strings on the command side. There’s nothing like an Admiral’s request to get things moving.”

You sighed with relief. “That’d be a huge help. The more people asking, the more likely we can get a meeting faster.” Now that you were calmer, you forced yourself stop playing with your fingers. “In the meantime, I’m going to contact my friend, T’Kel. She’s a lab vet on Earth. Hopefully she knows someone, who knows someone, who can put in a good word for us too. Civilian or Starfleet, the research community is pretty tightly knit.”

“What is the timetable?" Sisko asked.

“Once I get permission to conduct the drug trial, I’ll need twelve new live specimens to confirm the drug’s safety and efficacy in vivo. Even with the simulations, the Federation will want at least two weeks of hard data on real voles before we can move forward.”

“And if that all goes according to plan?”

"If everything works perfectly, we should be dropping the bait line a month from today. That gives the drug two weeks to build up in the feral voles before their mating season begins. I’ll monitor the feral and lab voles throughout the process to make sure the drug works as it should. If something goes wrong, the lab voles will serve as an advance warning. It’ll give us a two week safety margin to stop the drug in the feral voles.”

By the time you finished speaking, Sisko had his hand over the commbadge. “I’ll talk to Quark about getting you a holosuit.” Without hesitation, the commander tapped his communicator. “Sisko to O’Brien.”

“O’Brien here, Sir,” came the reply in an exhausted brogue.

“Chief, our veterinarian has a plan to stop the voles. We need ten of mixed genders. Dead is fine.”

There was a muffled cry from the other end of the line that sounded suspiciously like a whoop of joy. O’Brien quickly replied: “Yes, Sir! I’ll have my men out looking for them. We should have enough in an hour or two.”

Ten voles in an hour or two? Holy shit! This station must be loaded!

“Bring them to the science lab for scanning as soon as you’ve caught them,” Sisko chuckled, shaking his head: “And try not to hurt yourself, Chief.” With another tap of his badge, he opened a new commline. “Sisko to Lieutenant Dax.”

There was a slight paused before a cheerful female voice said: “Dax here, go ahead, Commander.”

“Our vet has a plan to stop the voles. Engineering is out catching some to scan into the holosuite. We need someone to help run the simulations, analyze the data and double check her FACUC protocol. If it looks good, I want this thing sent to committee by 1200 tomorrow.”

Again, another celebratory noise could be heard over the line. “I’d be happy to help,” Dax agreed. “Where should I meet her?"

“I’ll send her down to the science lab.”

“I’ll be here.”

You mind was spinning. Being in Starfleet was so different than civilian medicine. People seemed to be jumping to support you out of nowhere. Sure, vet school had emphasized teamwork, but you never expected the academic environment to translate this fully to the real world. Hearing everyone agree to help you without a second thought was one of the most uplifting experiences of your life.

Sisko rotated in his chair a bit as he tapped the commbadge for the third time. “Sisko to Dr. Bashir.” 

“Bashir here. Go ahead, Commander.”

Sisko’s speech was nearly predictable at this point. “The vet has a new idea to fix the pest problem. Engineering is going to capture some voles to scan into the holodeck. I need you to help the vet extrapolate genetic variance in the simulated voles once we get them analyzed.”

There was a crackle of static on the line. “That shouldn’t be too hard. Let me know once you get the data.”

Sisko closed the commline and turned back to you. “If this works, you'll have my gratitude."

Wide eyed and beaming, you simply said: “Thank you, Sir. I'll do my best."

 

 

Four hours later, you and Dax were seated in the science lab. You clutched the seat of your chair, gently swinging it from side to side. Dax was hunched over a PADD. You watched with passing interest as her eyes scanned across the screen. Her perfectly bowed lips were set in an ambiguously neutral pout. Finally, after a long period of stillness, she took her eyes off the device for a moment and leaned back languidly. Dax stretched her body in a strikingly feline manner, a contented sigh escaping her when her shoulder cracked. 

A small pocket of guilt appeared in your gut. It had taken her nearly two hours to go through your whole protocol. You had long since run out of voles to scan but felt as though leaving to run your data to Bashir would be akin to abandoning her. So, you chose to sit their and create blueprints of your vole habitats, silently hoping she wouldn’t find any gaping holes in your plan. Fidgeting, you adjusted the length of one of the containers. 

Each modular vole box was 1 metre long by 1 metre wide by 1.5 metres tall. The enclosures included three levels: floor, platform one, and platform two. A series of tubular ramps connected the levels. The bodies of the containers were constructed from 2 centimetre thick glass to prevent the voles from chewing their way out. Locking doors on the front of each cube allowed easy access for feeding and changing of the cellulose litter.

Since Cardassian voles were social animals, you decided to house them in groups (two females, one male) rather than solitarily. To this end, you designed the boxes to be joinable. On both sides of the cube were connecting ports with lift doors. These openings allowed you to link multiple enclosures together but separate the voles at feeding time. A tiny electromagnetic field generator would be placed on the back of the boxes to attract them to the bait. You only hoped that habitat design would meet with the committee's approval.

As if she could sense your anxiety, Dax turned to you. Her charming smile flashed in your direction. “It looks good,” she stated. “Your ‘brief summary’ section was pretty long. I transferred a lot of it to appendices. You’ll need to check and make sure I got it all correct.”

You grinned sheepishly. As much as you complained about Dr. Bashir, brevity was not a talent that you possessed either. “Thank you so much, Dax,” you murmured gratefully. “I got the voles all scanned in.”

Dax stood and extended her arms high above her head. Another pop came from her other shoulder. The woman was so gorgeous it was eerie. Even her long fingers looked elegant as she picked up the PADD and held it out to you over the central console.Where did Starfleet find their employees? Federation’s Next Top Model?

“Good. If you double check the new sections, I’ll make sure all the holodata got entered,” Dax said. “Have you got the enclosures designed yet?”

As you took the data PADD from Dax’s outstretched hand, you were shocked by how cold her fingers were **[2]**. “I think so,” you murmured self consciously. “...but I’d love a second opinion.”

Dax laughed. “Feeling nervous?” she asked, holding out her hand for your enclosure designs. 

“Just a bit,” you admitted, passing her the blueprints.

“It’ll be fine,” she assured you, glancing over your plans. “The modular design is a good idea. I’m sure they’ll approve it.” She turned back to the computer console and called up the programming data. You crossed your legs and settled into your chair for another rousing game of “proof-read the protocol”.

“So….” Dax started, scanning your holovole figures. “How was your first day?”

You glanced over at the Trill. As if she could feel your eyes on her, she lifted her head and sent you a friendly smile. You were rapidly forming an opinion on which animal Dax most resembled. The way she beamed reminded you of some type of dog. Based on looks alone, she would have to be a show dog. Perhaps a Golden Retriever? You could definitely see her with a long feathered tail, gliding through the show ring. The Golden’s warm geniality always seemed to glitter in her eyes. 

“The station is much bigger than I expected,” you replied. “I’m glad I got a tour yesterday or I’d get even more lost.”

Dax nodded in agreement, turning back to her work. “I felt the same way.” She typed something into the console before adding: “And how did you like Julian?” 

“Dr. Bashir…” You paused and let the words die in your throat. It seemed your brain was plenty content to be thoroughly unhelpful. It insisted you only recall all the ways that he made you want to punch him. This meant your gut response was probably a bit unprofessional. What could you say safely? He talks a lot? No, that’s no good. Think idiot, think.

“He seems very passionate about his work,” you stated sterilely.

Dax politely brought a hand to her mouth. Her left arm gripped her gut, stifling the heaves of restrained chuckles. The look on her face was something between amusement and understanding. “ **That** ,” she said, half-laughing, “is the most diplomatic comment I’ve heard outside of a negotiation room. What did he do to deserve it?”

You turned away from her, unsure of what to say next. This was becoming a slippery slope. If there was one thing you’d been lectured on in vet school over and over again it was professionalism. The teachers preached of professionalism the same way the Ferengi recited of the Rules of Acquisition. Amongst the list of things professionals shalt and shan't do, you distinctly recalled: ‘Thou Shalt Not Gossip. Gossip is not professional.’ You certainly weren’t going to argue that point. Gossip often lead to bickering, hurt feelings, and nasty staffing disputes. Not to mention, it made the person who did the gossiping look like a jerk. As big as DS9 was, you knew that it was just small enough for everybody to talk.

In your mind, you pictured T’kel’s steady face. The words of advice she’d repeated time and again floated to the surface of your thoughts: “Leave emotion out of it. Assess the situation as it is.”

Face serine as a stone, you refocused on your PADD. You let the silence build for a moment as you scrolled through the new tables. Pretending to be totally uninterested, you explained: “Some of the comments he made had an unintentional double meaning to me.”

“Such as….?” Dax coaxed. The lieutenant practically oozed charm as she pushed the conversation onward. Her blue eyes sparkled at you expectantly. You could see the gentle Golden Retriever again. It begged for you to throw it a bone. Your shields dropped to 50%. How could you say no to that face?

You sighed. “He’s very glad he was at the top of his class so he didn’t have to be ‘just some laboratory doctor on Earth’. Interesting, because my best friend is a laboratory vet on Earth.”

“Oh no… Was there more?” Dax urged. You could picture a soft paw resting expectantly on your leg. The loose jowls and big friendly eyes of your imaginary dog pushed you past the breaking point. Your shields failed. Hull breach on deck twelve. You were venting plasma.

Refusing to meet Dax’s eyes, you set the PADD down. You fingers quickly found each other, intertwining comfortingly. “It also seems that the four years of comparative species medicine I took were ‘surprisingly easy for him to learn once he had the basics’.”

“OHHHH!” Dax cried out with a sympathetic grimace. “He didn’t!”

A warp core breach was imminent. Gentlemen, it had been an honor.

“But, he’s very glad to have me here.” You snorted disgustedly. “He needed someone to ‘help him out’.”

Dax stared at you in disbelief. You slumped in the chair, relief and rage coursing through you like twin rivers of ice and fire. So much for not gossiping. Your cattiness would probably be legend around the station by dinner time tonight. Way to adhere to a higher standard. Good job, hero.

“Wow….” Dax sighed. “I am _so_ sorry.”

Quickly! You could still save yourself from a bad reputation! Backtrack! Backtrack! How could you fix this? **Wait!** What if you blamed yourself? Owning up to your faults usually looked good. You could spin this! _Think!_ If Dr. Bashir wasn’t to blame, why were you so mad? What hang up did you have? Why would you overreact so badly? 

You frowned and rested your head on folded fingers. Your eyes drifted down, mimicking the shame you ought to feel. It wasn’t hard. You really did feel stupid for gossiping when you knew better. “I feel bad,” you confessed. “There’s no way he meant it like that, but it just… bothered me. I had to study a lot in school and I’m just jealous that Bashir could get all this material down so quickly. I wish I could just stop being so…” You paused to choose the right word. “ _oversensitive..._ ”

Dax gently set a hand on your shoulder. “You’re not being oversensitive. He shouldn’t have said those things.” With a deeply empathetic smile, she added: “Would you like me to talk to him?”

Score! You were off the hook. The only problem was that, in addition to manipulating Dax, you had convinced yourself of your contribution to the problem. You were starting to feel awful guilty for being nasty to Bashir. Regardless of how the comments hit you, a professional really would have held it together instead of snarking like a child. You bet T’kel wouldn’t have been offended. T’kel would have also kept her mouth shut. Man, you really needed to act more like her.

You looked up from your thoughts to see Dax peering at you. You blanched. Crap! You were taking to long to respond. Okay. Change of subject time. How could you make this conversation happy again? Um… Um…

The dog! Dogs are happy!

“He already knows,” you sputtered, shaking your head violently. “And he already apologized! I think he even tried to make it up to me. He took extra time yesterday to introduce me to Gunner.”

The second you said the dog’s name, Dax practically glowed. Clearly, you had picked the right subject. It seemed that Gunner was DS9’s furry happy place. 

“Gunner can fix just about anybody’s problems,” Dax agreed, a distant gleam in her eyes.

You laughed. “I know, right? With those black button eyes and big fluffy fur? He’s a walking teddy bear.”

Dax wagged a teasing finger at you. “And he’s a snuggler.”

“Now if only I could figure out what he’s barking at. I know it’s a Keeshound thing, but he talks more than Bashir,” you joked.

Dax grinned at you knowingly. “If only we could talk to the animals,” she quoted.

You grimaced at the reference to your least favorite doctor. Dax looked at you with deep concern. 

“Something the matter?” she asked.

“Well…actually…” you mumbled, twiddling your thumbs. “I _really_ don’t like Dr. Doolittle.”

“What’s the matter with him?” Dax questioned curiously. 

You sighed, lifted your head and looked her straight in the eye with an apologetic smile. “It’s just the colonialism and the use of racist language in that book really put me off.” Recalling your communication lessons from vet school yet again, you decided to end the remark on a more positive note. “However, I **love** the James Herriot books.”

Dax leaned into the conversation with great interest.“I haven’t read those yet.”

“Oh then put them on your list!” you insisted with an over-dramatic flick of your wrist. “They’re more realistic and they always make me feel so inspired. I used to listen to the audioreadings whenever I was feeling down in school.”

“I guess I’ll have to check them out,” Dax proclaimed, returning to her happy mood.

You nodded and stood up. “I’m going to take the scans over to Dr. Bashir. Hopefully it won’t take him too long to model the genetic diversity. After that, we can get started on these simulations.” Grabbing the PADD with the vole scans, you added: “Be back soon!” 

Dax waved at you, wiggling her fingers cutely. “I’ll be here!”

As you walked out the doors of the science lab, you smiled to yourself just a bit. 

Dax was **definitely** a Golden.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **[1]** : While this is an appropriate plan in the ST universe ~~dues ex machina medicine anyone?~~ , it is a completely unrealistic timetable for real life. Getting protocols approved can take months. Starting experiments even longer. Giving drugs to wildlife populations after only a few weeks of testing in real animals? No freaking way! We're making the assumption that things go must faster in the ST universe because they can run simulations on holodecks and we can't.
> 
>  **[2]** : "It's a peculiarity of the Trill." DS9: Season 1, Episode 4
> 
>  
> 
> Man, that was a long chapter. It took Geckomama two days to finish critiquing it. In case you hadn't figured out by now, she's one amazingly, kind-hearted, patient woman. Chapter 6 is waiting to be beta-ed, but should be up in a week or three depending on our testing cycles.


	6. A Responsible Adult

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Timeline update** : Chapters 6-9 occur around the time of Profit and Loss (Season 2, Episode 17)

Joannah barely looked up from her perch as you burst into the room. One bronze-yellow eye opened about two millimetres to inspect you. Out of breath and running out of time, you tore through your quarters like a typhoon. You chucked an extra pair of shoes out of the way and tossed a pre-worn bra over your shoulder. One of the shoes made a loud thunk as it connected with something to your side.

“Where the _heck_ did I put it?!” you demanded to no one in particular. You looked up at your pet hopefully, but she simply closed her eye and turned her head away from you. Draping it carefully over her front legs, she let out a small sigh and went back to sleep under her heat emitter. On her elbow, you could see yet another white flake of the stuck shed you’d been battling since your arrival on the station. You frowned at it so harshly it should have vaporized on the spot. Jealously, you wished you could curl up and go to bed instead of to your meeting. 

Thanks to Sisko, Dax, T’kel, and Bashir calling in numerous favors, the FACUC was able to review and approve your vole protocol about two days after it arrived **[1]**. You split the next two weeks between your drug trial patients and herd health examinations for transport vessels. Now that all the preparations for the bait line drops were made, you had only one more hurdle: presenting the grand plan at the officers’ briefing. You were on your way to do just that, **if** you could find the PADD with your map of the bait drop locations on it.

As you crawled around the side of your couch, you spotted a flash of silver beneath the coffee table. Leaping forward, you thrust your head under the tempered glass and groped for the PADD. Tears of joy began to fall as your right arm clutched the device to your chest. Triumphantly, you rose like a Goddess of Resurrection carrying nothing less than holy scripture in her hands.

THWWAAAACKKK

Joannah lifted her head in alarm and scanned the room. The only thing she found was her owner cursing angrily and rubbing the large bump where the back of her head collided with the table. As your tears of joy turned into tears of pain, your bright red face glowered at the glass with enough ferocity to set ice on fire.

“When I get back…” you growled, pointing a shaking finger at the table, “I will **break** you.”

With your hollow threat impressing no one, Joannah lowered her head again and curled up to continue her afternoon nap. You grumbled a few more threats for good measure before snatching your fallen PADD. Map in hand, you sprinted out the door, barely remembering to lock it behind you.

 

 

Fueled by frustration and the throbbing in your head, you made it to the meeting in record time. You flung yourself off the turbolift, dashed up the corridor and only slowed when you saw Dax at the doors to the Wardroom.

“I swear... I’m... a responsible... adult...” you panted. Your breath danced in front of you, just out of reach. The sharp pain in your side made it impossible to catch it right away. Dax smiled at you indulgently, a mix of amusement and satisfaction lifting the edges of her lips.

“Oh... I never doubted that for a second.” Dax’s grin grew just a little wider at your flushed face. With air in your lungs and a rock in your gut, you finally stood up straight. Dax gestured you through the door, looking a little too smug for your taste. 

Unsurprisingly, the Wardroom was the same color and design as the rest of the station. With grey layered upon grey, you found it cold and bland like plain oatmeal that had been left to sit out all day. The only color in the long, spacious room came from the maroon octagonal blocks on the carpet. Nestled along the back wall were five, large, rounded windows that peered out into, what else, space. In the center of the room was a long table with inlaid blue lights. Two pitchers of water sat on either side of the center piece, with a small stack of drink cups by each one. There were about fourteen swivel chairs around the table. On the wall, between the two doors, was a map of the station similar to the one diagrammed in the technical manual. On the far end of the room was the view screen you would be presenting from. 

There were already a few people seated around the table when you arrived. You immediately recognized Chief O’Brien by his puffy cloud of blond hair and haggard looking blue eyes. His well wrinkled brow looked more perky this morning, probably thanks to the cup of coffee in his large hands. Bashir was at the chief's side, cheerfully monologuing his way through some new story. His brown eyes were alight and his voice only grew louder as the narrative progressed. O’Brien did his best to follow along, but you noticed his eyes looked rather glazed over.

Next to O’Brien was Major Kira, the Bajoran liaison and second in command of DS9. The bright red uniform and no-frills, utilitarian hair cut suited her personality. Passionate as burning flame and fierce as a Sabercat, she commanded respect with every gesture. The first time you saw her, she was arguing with Commander Sisko about Bajoran politics. Their “discussion” could be heard throughout all of Ops and echoed down the turbolift. Though she was not speaking to you, the sheer force of her words had sent you packing back to the Science Labs. It was only thanks to a proper, more tempered, introduction by Dax that you were able to view her as a person instead of a force of nature. You were still determined to never get on her bad side.

Major Kira was speaking to Odo, the head of Security. When Bashir had first described the “constable”, you had been overwhelmingly excited to meet him. You pictured a quick thinking, rule breaking, matter-of-fact gumshoe who was rather like the heroes in detective novels. Odo was indeed all of these things, but he also came with a stick up his butt that was longer than your forearm. Every time you were running late to an appointment, the browless blond appeared out of thin air to lecture you on proper walking speed. You secretly suspected that he spent all day lying in wait for you to go sprinting by. It had reached the point where, every time you heard his gritty voice, you vomited excuses for running without even breaking stride. You were pretty sure he viewed you as a pebble in his shoe. The feeling was growing mutual.

“So…” Dax asked, walking you to the view screen. “Feel ready?”

You connected the PADD to the computer, silently berating yourself for not uploading your data to the mainframe to begin with. “I hope so. I’ve been practicing all morning.”

Dax put a hand on your shoulder. “I know, I heard you mumbling to yourself.”

“That’s embarrassing,” you groaned.

“You’ll be fine,” Dax reassured, making her way back to seat. “You’ve worked hard.”

The moment Dax sat down, Bashir greeted her enthusiastically. You could see the immense relief on O’Brien’s face when the good doctor’s attentions were focused elsewhere. As the map loaded, you noticed Dax gesturing towards you. Bashir looked at you in a concerned manner. Once they realized you were watching, they both faked smiles and waved at you. You tried to smile back, but it came out as a painful wince. 

Finally, mercifully, Sisko arrived. He swept into the room and quickly took his seat at the head of the table. You wished you could bottle that confidence of his. You sure could use it right now.

“Sorry I’m late,” Sisko declared, tugging his shirt down. He gestured to you with a broad wave of his arm. “Whenever you’re ready, Doctor.”

You felt your heart slamming against your rib cage. You swallowed, forcing your rapidly thickening saliva down into your violently churning stomach. Sweaty, clammy palms grasped your PADD. Your nostrils flared as you willed yourself to breath normally. Maybe if your brain could get some oxygen, you might be able to recall what was in your report.

As you looked around the room, your grand plan failed you. Your eyes flitted from one face to another, searching for anything to trigger your memories. It wasn’t until you reached Dax’s bright eyes that something stirred in your head. You had spent hours obsessing over your voles, babbling about their biology and behavior to her over the past weeks. All you had to do was channel that obsession into your thoughts now. 

Dax nodded encouragingly, her excited smile beaming at you. You took another deep breath and began your explanation.

“As many of you are aware, Cardassian voles have a lifespan of six months. The voles are about three and a half months old now **[2]**. They breed at four months and have babies by five months. They only live to see one breeding season, which is why they are such prolific parents. If only one female vole survives, she is capable of producing an average of fifteen babies in one breeding cycle.” 

Now that you were in the zone, you let the lecture consume you. Hand gestures which had been jerky and awkward smoothed into gentle, open handed emphasises. Your heart still pounded, but the beat was steady like the drumline in a song.

“Therefore, simply killing the adults we find is not enough. Unless you can stop all the ones we can’t kill from having babies, fifteen more will just take their place. We have to go where the voles live: in the uninhabited parts of the station.”

With your speech well on its way, your body seemed to be doing its best to distract you. You had spent all morning with your lab voles rehearsing your presentation.. Too nervous to eat, you lived on black coffee and pure adrenaline. Both were wearing off now that you were calming down. The nausea you’d felt was quickly replaced by a low rumbling noise; it seemed your stomach finally recalled it had not been fed.

“As you’ll recall, the voles were not a problem until people entered the unused parts of the station. If given the choice, the voles will always return to the uninhabited ‘prime real estate’ where there are no humanoids to bother them. At the moment, their population is simply too big to fit in the few unused areas left. That’s why they’ve spread out and destroyed our systems. When the voles in the ‘prime real estate’ breed, only some of their offspring can stay there due to space constraints. The others will be forced into the inhabited parts of the station. There, they will have to compete with the offspring of the voles who were already living in the inhabited sections. It’s not ideal and the voles would much rather return to the unused areas.”

As your speech continued, you could hear the solution to your problem like a tune in your ears. The melody hummed brightly, carrying part one of your plan across your mind and out your mouth like a hymn during a Bajoran religious service.

“First, we have to stop them from breeding. The birth control formula I’ve modified will be placed into some edible bait. We’ll drop the bait line by transporter twice daily in multiple points around the unused parts of the ship.” You paused here to gesture to the station layout on the screen behind you. There were several red circles around empty quarters, unused cargo bays, and the old ore processing facilities. “Then, we will create a low level electrical field to draw the resident voles to the bait. If we get them started on the compound now, an entire generation of vole females will be infertile by the time the breeding season hits in two weeks.”

“If we can transport the bait in, why can’t we just transport the voles out?” Major Kira questioned. You looked over to O’Brien for help. The curly haired blond sighed as he swiveled in his chair and shook his head.

“We tried. There are too many voles for us to get a lock on them. We’d be at it all day every day trying to get them all.” After finishing his explanation to the Major, O’Brien turned his sunken blue eyes to you. “What I want to know is what we’re doing about the voles in the rest of the station?”

His question didn’t faze you at all. Already, the counterpoint of your plan was playing in your mind. It swiftly crescendoed and then triumphantly decrescendoed into a glorious harmony, weaving in and out of the first part of your plot to cover any holes in the melody.

“We don’t have enough bait to cover the whole station,” you explained. “Security and Engineering will continue shooting any voles we find outside the bait zone. Once the first generation of baited voles dies of old age, the pressure to survive and the newly unoccupied territory will draw the voles toward the bait lines. From there, the process repeats itself.”

“Hehh…” Odo huffed from the back end of the table. He leaned forward, crossing his arms and lifting his head high. “If we’re just going to kill them, why don’t we lay down poison bait instead of birth control?”

“Poison would be faster,” you agreed, “but not fast enough. The voles would hide themselves deep in the station the second they started to feel ill. Do you really want half dead voles crawling all over the station and croaking in the conduits?”

“And how is birth control so much better?” he argued. “Won’t the voles crawl into the walls and hide before death either way?”

“When voles die naturally, other voles consume their flesh for nutrients and to hide it from predators. That’s why you never noticed them before they started chewing the wires,” you countered. “If we poison them, the carcass will still be loaded with toxin when another vole eats it. Then you'll have twice as many dead voles rotting and stinking in the walls. If we let them die of old age, there is no mess for us to clean up.”

Odo leaned back in his chair again, staring at you impassively. Having satisfied his questions, you scanned the room. Major Kira was sitting straight up in her chair, brown eyes seeking yours. The minute you caught her gaze, she began to speak.

“Why use a low level electrical field?” Kira inquired. “Wouldn’t a high level field attract more voles?”

The image of the fried vole in your replicator came unbidden to the top of your thoughts. You shook your head to clear the mental stench. “No, the voles that like high level fields are already wiped out from electrocution. It’s the voles that like low level fields that survive to chew again. They’re who we want to target. The other population is self limiting.”

You glanced around the room one more time, the ringing finale of your plan roaring in your ears. The other officers were looking at each other with small smiles on their faces. You beamed.

Commander Sisko caught your eye and smiled at you proudly. “Well, I think it sounds like a plan,” he commented, rising from his chair. “Are there any other questions?”

No one in the room spoke.

“Good,” Sisko stated. He turned back to you. “Doctor, you and Chief O’Brien will begin the bait line drop this evening.”

You glanced at the computer and noted it was about 1230 now. “Understood, Sir.” You nodded.

“Dismissed.”

As everyone stood to leave the room, you gathered your belongings. PADD in hand, you turned away from the other officers and shut the view screen off. Your stomach rumbled loudly once more. Suddenly, a tap on your right shoulder caused your heart to leap out of your chest. You gasped and flung your head around only to see a very bewildered Bashir, his hand on your shoulder.

“I didn’t mean to startle you,” he apologized.

Feeling rather idiotic, you shook your head. “Oh no! It’s just me. I’m just jumpy. Probably too much coffee.”

All at once, a low rumbling noise growled its way across the wardroom. You covered your stomach with a sheepish grin, trying to ignore the peristaltic contractions. 

Bashir raised an eyebrow at you. “And what did you have aside from coffee?”

“More coffee?” you joked with a shrug.

“Mhmm…” Bashir hummed, crossing his arms. “That’s what Dax tells me. According to her, you’ve had a steady diet of caffeine and saltine crackers for the past four days.”

You chuckled awkwardly; Bashir hit the nail on the head. The problem really began with the stress from the vole project. Normally, low levels of continuing stress made you stuff yourself like Tribble, but you simply didn’t have time to accomplish that. Between finishing your enclosure designs, meeting with Commander Sisko for progress updates, dealing with demanding clients and (most awfully) finishing mounds of paperwork, you’d nary time to breathe, let alone eat. You were lucky when you managed to sneak some crackers from the box which now lived next to the voles’ new homes (health regulations be damned). Who had time for Replimat lines when you had to fill out forms in triplicate. Why did they even need to be in triplicate anyways? Everything was digital! Couldn’t someone at Starfleet get off their lazy ass and just copy the damned file? I mean really...

“I eat other foods,” you argued, one hand on your right hip.

“Such as?”

“Popcorn…” you offered weakly. Bashir didn’t look impressed. He brought his hand up to his face and pinched the bridge of his nose. Suspicious brown eyes looked over his fingers, sizing you up.

“When is the last time you sat down and ate a meal?”

“Yesterday,” you answered proudly.

“Without the voles.”

You looked away from the doctor and bit your lip. Bashir replied with an exasperated sigh, pinching his nose harder. After a moment, he let his hand fall back down.

“All right, that’s it,” he declared, reaching for your wrist. You took a step back just out of his grasp and shot him a leery look. Mercifully, Bashir picked up on your discomfort. While he didn’t try to touch you again, he was far from done speaking. “You’re going to come with me to the Replimat, sit down, and eat something with a vegetable and a source of protein in it.”

“But I have to-”

“The voles will survive,” he stated, motioning you to follow him. “Unlike you, they don’t forget to eat.”

You trailed behind him, dragging your feet like a child on their way to a time out. You considered blowing him off, but decided against it when you realized he could just order you to come instead. After all, he was the Chief Medical Officer.

Stupid Starfleet regulations.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **[1]** : Again, this is not very realistic. No committee I know can crank through a protocol that fast if for no other reason than they are swamped with work. However, Star Trek manages to accomplish much crazier things in far less time. (Just how fast can the Defiant travel to Earth anyways?) I feel like this isn't wholly improbable for the Star Trek universe, so please just bare with it knowing that it's problematic.
> 
>  **[2]** : I have no idea how the voles of DS9 know it's the breeding season. Normally, animals with mating seasons are influenced by their environment. For example, sheep are "short day breeders" meaning that they mate when the amount of daylight is decreasing (fall). Temperature can also be a trigger (such as in fish). However, the hours of light and temperature remain constant on DS9 year round. The voles must use some other sign to trigger their breeding season. ~~Maybe the writers of the show told them?~~ For now, I'll assume the cannon is correct and the voles just magically know.


	7. Not Fit to be in Public

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 8 needs to be beta-ed by the lovely "Geckomama The Great" and then it will be up. We hope to have it ready to go by the end of the month. Both of us are in the middle of midterms, so expect the updates to slow down. I have a first rough draft though chapter 15 now. To keep you updated on the story placing, there will be at least 16 chapters before the events of "The Wire". We're taking our time and having fun with it.

"Two turkey sandwiches, two Tarkalen teas, and two small cups of vegetable soup," Bashir ordered. The industrial replicator hummed to life, creating the food, plates and a tray in a sparkling glow. He grabbed the tray and beckoned you to come with him. You frowned and grumpily followed him to a nearby round table. The doctor separated the food, placing half of it near himself and handing the tray with the other meal to you. Never in your life had you felt so micromanaged. For crying out loud, he didn’t even let you order off your own rations! How old did he think you were?! Six?

“Do you always force feed the other members of your staff?” you asked, seating yourself at the table. Bashir only stared at you expectantly. You defiantly raised an eyebrow at him. His eyes flicked from you to your food and then back to again. You rolled your eyes, threw your hands up exasperatedly, and picked up the sandwich. “ **Fine!** I’m eating!”

With you finally partaking of food, Bashir looked content. “I don’t usually have to. The rest of the doctors tend to feed themselves.”

“This _may_ come as a bit of a shock to you," you grumbled, taking another bite of your meal. You chewed it quickly and swallowed before continuing: "but I’m a big girl, and capable of taking care of myself."

“I’d hardly call saltines, popcorn, and coffee ‘taking care’ of oneself," he argued, spooning up some soup. You set your sandwich down.

“I’ve been busy," you countered.

You certainly weren’t exaggerating there. In the past two weeks you’d written thirty healthy certificates, managed a lab full of voles, replicated vast stocks of rodent birth control, and nearly been punched by an Andorian freighter Captain who was quite insulted when you told him his flat-faced owlcat had fleas.

“Most people make the time to eat,” Bashir pointed out.

Oh really? He was going to lecture you about time management was he? Well maybe your **humanoid** counterpart could take breaks because he had a staff to back him up, but you didn't even have one veterinary technician. Any time _you_ needed help, you trained the client to assist you on the fly. Starfleet was backed up getting vet techs as it was, and none of the techs would take a position so far from home. You couldn't blame them.

“Most people have a _team_ ," you snapped. "I’m all by myself.”

Bashir opened his mouth to say something, but a cheerful voice cut him off.

“Well if it isn’t the two doctors!” Garak exclaimed happily. He stood beside your table like a grinning gargoyle, exceptionally pleased with himself. On his tray was a plate of some dish you couldn't recognize and a blue cup which emitted a pungent odor. With an innocent smile and a tilt of his head he asked: “May I join you?”

“Yes, please!” You grasped the seat of your chair and hurriedly shuffled over to make room on your right side. Anything was more welcome than a continuation of Dr. Bashir’s nutrition lecture. 

Garak politely set his tray down and retrieved a chair. Bashir shot you another look, and gestured to your food. You pointedly ignored him. As you blew off the doctor, Garak turned to you. “Dr. Herriot, I haven’t seen you since our first encounter.” He tilted his head and smirked as if he knew a secret. “I was beginning to think you’d vanished.”

“I’ve been holed up with my voles,” you explained, taking another sip of soup to satisfy Bashir.

“She’d still be there if I hadn’t dragged her out and forced her to eat,” the doctor added. You crossed your arms and rolled your eyes again.

“I see...” Garak trailed off contemplatively. He looked at your mostly full plate and then observed Bashir’s mostly empty one. He gave Bashir a knowing smile before looking back to you: “Well, I’m glad you’re out and about. I’ve been very curious about your plans to rid the station of voles.” The word ‘curious’ came with a raised brow ridge and a widening grin. “My own people have been fighting them for decades without success. What _is_ your secret?”

“It’s... a long story…” you replied slowly, recalling Bashir’s warning about Garak the spy

“Oh, I have the time," Garak insisted, flashing you a charming smile. " _Please_ , indulge me."

Unsure, you turned to the other doctor. In response to your helpless look he simply nodded for you to go on. Clearly, this wasn't a worrying topic of conversation. With free rein and a willing audience, you decided to just run with it.

“Well…” You rested an elbow on the table and leaned on your arm. “As you know, shooting the voles wasn’t solving the problem. I was thinking that some sort of bait might work since they seem so hungry all the time. So I looked up their behavior and biology on the medical database, hoping to find something to use against them. Once I found out they were cannibalistic, I knew poison would be a bad idea. They’d just die in the walls.”

“Indeed!” Garak agreed; his nose wrinkled as if trying to avoid some disgusting smell. “Many a would-be exterminator learned that the hard way.”

You lifted your head and nodded excitedly. “Then I saw their lifespan. I figured if we could stop them from giving birth, it would lower their numbers dramatically.”

“What an interesting idea!” Garak nodded encouragingly at you. “How do you plan to stop their reproductive cycle?”

“I modified an old birth control formula designed for Terran rodents,” you explained, leaning into the conversation. “All the simulations looked good and the laboratory voles are responding to it well so far. We’re going to drop bait lines in the unused sections of the station where the voles are thriving. If all goes well, half the voles on the station with die of old age with no progeny to replace them.”

“And the other half?”

“We’ll continue shooting as many as we can. Any voles that escape the phasers will flee to the unused parts of the ship once the territory is freed up. There they will be attracted to the bait lines and the process will repeat until there are no voles left.”

“A very original plan, Doctor,” Garak complimented.

“Not really,” you dismissed tactfully. You sat back a little in your seat and focused on your remaining food. “The pieces were all there in the voles’ behavior. I’m just the person who happened to put it together first. Someone else would have figured it out if I hadn’t.”

“Nevertheless, the ability to aggregate information in a timely manner is a gift,” Garak declared, taking another sip of his foul smelling drink.

Bashir snorted. “You would know all about that, wouldn’t you, Garak?”

“Yes, I find that gathering information on the latest fashions is critical to the business of any good tailor,” Garak agreed. Bashir’s sour face clearly told you that this was not what he’d implied. You tried not to giggle at his expense.

Watching Garak and Bashir talk was like watching the interactions between a cat and a dog. Every time Bashir butted in with an observation about Garak, the Cardassian swatted it down like an old feline with an inquisitive puppy. Garak’s speech was sleek and refined; he conducted the conversation carefully and with great precision. On the other hand, Bashir was much more in the now of the discussion, jumping in wherever he felt he could contribute.

You envisioned your whole lunch exchange rather like a new pet observing the interactions between the current residents of your home. You pictured yourself as a young calico cat: content with interaction, but equally as pleased to be left alone most of the time. Bashir was obviously a Labrador Retriever if your previous interactions were any hint of character. Garak, however, was much harder to match to an animal. You were just trying to decide on a breed of cat for him, when you remembered that the bait line drop was tonight. Your mood became significantly less cheerful and your once blooming appetite was replaced with a knot of anxiety.

“I just hope they’ll find the bait,” you murmured. Both men looked over at you. As you saw their faces, you knew you had the right imaginary species. Garak was interested, but thoughtfully waiting to see what would happen. On the other hand, Bashir was attentive and actively concerned. True to lab form, he plowed right on through your worries by settling himself directly in the center of everything.

“You said it was working,” Bashir observed.

“Yes, but that’s in simulations and a controlled laboratory setting,” you countered. Your voice became quiet and distant as you stared into the bottom of your soup bowl. “Real life usually takes your best laid plans and tears them to pieces.”

“Ah,” Garak wagged a dismissive finger at you. “But as Alket tells us in ‘The Fractured Course’, nothing is broken unless one refuses to reassemble the pieces.” Garak turned to Bashir with great glee. “On the subject of Cardassian literature, Doctor, have you finished ‘The Never Ending Sacrifice’ yet?”

“Not yet,” Bashir replied, looking exhausted at the mere mention of the book. “It’s a rather long read.”

Garak smiled knowingly and took a sip of his odiferous drink. “Give it time Doctor, it does span seven generations.”

Now that he had found something he enjoyed, Garak threw himself into the middle of the conversation. You pictured him as some sort of long grey cat, flopping down on his owner’s warm consul and blocking the viewscreen. Perhaps he was a Russian Blue? He certainly matched their deliberate and independent personality.

“Now... Dr. Herriot,” Garak started, snapping you out of your thoughts. “Aside from your slice of life veterinary novels, what do you read?”

“O-oh!” you stammered, getting your head back in the game. “I’m a murder mystery fan. Particularly Agatha Christie’s Poirot or Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes. However, I also enjoyed the mysteries of Hammett and Edgar Allen Poe.”

“Just mystery?” Garak urged politely.

“No no, thrillers too. Harris’s ‘Silence of the Lambs’ was amazing to read.”

“What about ‘Tinker, Tailor, Solider, Spy’ or ‘Our Man in Havana’?” Julian asked. You examined him and noticed a bright enthusiasm in his face. You couldn’t help but see him as the excitable lab who followed the new cat around wanting to play.

You shook your head. “No, I really don’t much care for spy fiction myself. The plot lines are rather hokey and the characters are just so over the top.”

“And I suppose Sherlock Holmes is more realistic?” Julian countered. He just sounded like a frustrated puppy, whining because you wouldn’t play along with his change of subject. Had you really been a cat, you would have walked away at that point. However, since you were gifted with opposable thumbs and a large brain, you chose to justify yourself instead.

“Excellent observational skills are hardly superpower,” you pointed out. “The ability to charm every double D-… I mean _double agent_.” You paused to collect your tongue; remember T’kel, remove personal biases. “Oh you know… a new girl every chapter just seems like a power fantasy.” Close, but not quite vulcan.

Garak snorted. Julian looked like you’d swatted him across the nose.

“Is something the matter?” you asked.

“Oh nothing, Doctor.” Garak smiled at the cat-dog interaction like it was greatly entertaining. Something wicked twinkled in the Cardassian’s eyes. “I believe you’ve just trampled the good Doctor’s fantasies.”

It took you about two seconds to realize exactly why Bashir mentioned the spy titles. You blanched. “Oh God Julian, I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to insult your taste.”

“Well, a dose of honesty is refreshing given the company.” Julian sent Garak a pointed look.

“But if it’s your favorite type of story, you must be seeing something in them that I’m not!” you protested. You knew you’d need to really work to salvage this relationship. You purposefully opened your eyes wide and let your expression read nothing but innocent regret. All hands on deck, commence operation suck-up. “If you have a good recommendation, I’d love to read it. Maybe you can change my mind.”

For all your effort Julian looked a little perkier. He sat up taller and smiled sadly at you. You thought he might say something, but Garak elegantly guided the conversation onwards before you could put your foot in your mouth again.

“If you like mystery novels, Doctor Herriot, I would highly recommend you read Shoggoth’s ‘Enigma Tales’.” Garak explained. “It would give you a chance to see what Cardassian literature has to offer.”

“Oh really? I haven’t read any Cardassian novels before. What differences should I expect from Federation books?” you asked.

Garak’s smile resembled the cat that got the Thanksgiving turkey. He leaned forward and began to pontificate on Cardassian authors with such enthusiasm that you felt rooted to your seat by those blue eyes. You listened attentively for a long while, noting how perfectly content he looked during the dissertation. Garak hardly seemed to breathe as reference after reference poured off his tongue. Bashir sat back in his chair, watching Garak speak with an amused smile.

As Garak continued to expound on the finer points of Cardassian literature, you found yourself distracted. At the very bottom of his ear ridge was a small, pale spot. Unconsciously, you placed a thumb in your warm tea and let it soak. You watched his ear, completely spellbound by the flaking scales. As he spoke, the skin below the thin membrane shifted with his words. His voice seemed to grow more and more distant until you heard nothing but a calming murmur of speech. Just then, the skin stopped moving, and the background noise quieted. From the corner of your vision, you caught Garak’s quizzical ridge lift. A different voice, probably Julian’s, immediately filled the silence. You couldn’t have cared less.

Without thinking, you reached for Garak’s left ear. Two small circular rubs with your tea moistened thumb were followed by a swift downwards swipe. The offending scale was gone. 

As you pulled your hand back you noticed the flake on your thumb. You also realized that Julian has stopped talking. Brain kicking back on, your eyes flew to Garak’s face. All you found there was a wide eyed look of pure violation.

“OhmyGodI’msosorry!” you stammered in horror. “I just… Joannah… It’s just… I didn’t....” Your hand groped blindly around the table, reaching for something, anything, to fix your social gaffe. “Let me get you a towel!”

Finally, you felt a piece of soft, absorbent paper under your fingertips. As you ripped it off the table, your left elbow managed to catch your mug of tea. The sweet brown liquid rolled across the table top, dripping off the edge closest to Julian. Garak stood up. Scandalized, he kept an arm’s length between himself and you. Your face turned the color of a ripe tomato.

“Oh damn it,” Bashir cursed as the tea dripped onto his upper thigh. Julian began to stand up as you grabbed another wad of napkins. You started to reach down to dry his leg, but your brain quickly reminded you exactly how close to the doctor’s crotch your hand would be if you performed that action. You froze and fixed him with a look of utter shame. Bowing your head, you shoved the napkins into his hands. Determined to cast your eyes anywhere else but on the faces of your two companions, you finally settled on the tea. Burning with humiliation, you grabbed the last napkins on the tabletop and began sopping up the mess you’d made of your life.

“I am not fit to be in public…” you whimpered in disgrace.

“Indeed,” Garak muttered.

You stopped wiping. Filled with embarrassment, you managed a weak: “I’ll go get more napkins”. Shoulders slumped and eyes down, you dragged yourself to the napkin containers about four metres away. Your fingers trembled as you yanked the napkins from the container, one by one.

Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine.

The warm weight of a hand on your shoulder made you pause. You looked up as Julian plucked a napkin from your bundle. “I think that’s plenty,” he stated gently. Over his shoulder, you made eye contact with Garak.

“Well…” the Cardassian huffed. “This has been a most… intimate discussion, but I am afraid I really must to return to my shop.” With a quick nod to Bashir, he disappeared into the crowd.

You turned to Bashir with a thoroughly mortified expression “I am SO **SORRY**! I don’t even know how to begin apologizing for this.”

“It was only a bit of tea...” he reassured, patting your shoulder.

You gestured wildly with your hands, pointing to the messy table and Garak’s empty seat. “Bu-but… Garak… and…” Your fingers grasped the sides of your head, tearing at your hair. With a small stamp of your foot, you groaned: “Oh…..why am I so **stupid**!”

Julian’s hand squeezed your shoulder comfortingly. “You’re not stupid. It was an accident.”

Far from agreeing with Bashir, you rolled into an internal death spiral of self-condemnation. Of course Bashir would say that. Here you were crying and whining, so anyone within hearing would be obligated to console you. He and his friend are the ones that were wronged and now he was stuck comforting you out of politeness. You’d taken a situation which was all your fault and painted yourself as the martyr. Good job, hero.

“I feel so awful…” you moaned.

Bashir shook his head and smiled encouragingly. “I’m sure this will all blow over by tomorrow. I’ll go talk to Garak later.” You barely heard his words through your haze of guilt, self loathing, and misery. “Now,” Julian’s loud voice ripped you from your thoughts as he attempted to change the topic with all the grace of an ataxic Algorian mammoth “Who is Joannah?”

“Oh…” you faltered, bringing yourself back to the present. “She’s my lizard.”

Julian grabbed onto the conversation like a tractor beam. “Oh really! What a **unique** pet! I didn’t know you had an animal with you on the station.”

Parental pride rapidly replacing the cold ball of shame in your stomach, you warmed to the topic immediately. Beaming like a new mother you told Bashir: “I brought her with me from Earth. I had my name on the breeder’s wait list for eight months before she was even hatched. It was another three months before I could bring her home. I’ve had her four years now. She’s my baby.”

Bashir’s interest only seemed to grow with your enthusiasm. “I enjoyed working with the animals before you arrived, but I’ve never had a reptilian patient. Could I meet her?”

“Um… sure…” You could picture the dirty clothing that was scattered all around your living room. It’d been at least a week since you picked up around your quarters. Joannah loved burrowing in your laundry, so you usually didn’t bother unless you had company. “My quarters are a disaster though. You’ll have to give me time to clean up. It’s not fit for guests right now.”

“I’m sure it’s fine. In fact,” Bashir cast a glance at the growing audience which had been watching your misadventures, “why don’t we go. Now.”

Before you could protest, Julian cleaned up what was left of your mess and practically wheeled you out of the Replimat.


	8. Varanid Husbandry

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Progress Note:** Chapter 9 needs to be beta-ed. We should have it up sometime in March. Prepare yourselves for a detailed explanation of the history of vet med in Star Trek.
> 
>  **Author's note:** Geckomama just pointed out that we passed 100 views and I totally missed it. I can not tell you how awesome it is that people really want to read this story. Thanks all of you! :3 So happy. Wow. Much love.

Once the conversation about your darling pet started, there was no stopping you. You babbled about the temperatures, humidity settings and exercise requirements on the turbo lift. Once in the corridor of the habit ring, you talked about her behavior and uneasiness around strangers. By the time you reached your quarters, Julian had Joannah’s life history and crash course in Varanid husbandry. You couldn’t tell if Bashir’s interest was genuine or strictly politeness, but a warm body to preach reptile management and care to was too good an opportunity to pass up. It was only as you reached your quarters that your embarrassment returned.

You held out and hand at Julian, forcing him to stay an arm’s length from the door. “Wait a second and I'll make sure I have it cleaned.” Bashir raised an eyebrow and frowned a bit, but took a few steps away from the door. You waved him over to one side so that he would be totally out of the line of sight. He rolled his eyes and, with an amused smile, leaned against the wall. 

It was only after you were satisfied he couldn’t see inside that you rushed through the doors as fast as you could. Diving for the bra hanging for your kitchen set, you tore it off the chair and ran into your bedroom to grab a laundry basket. As you dragged the hamper back into the living area, Joannah looked up from her basking rock by the couch. You ignored her and bustled into the bathroom to grab last night’s dirty underwear. From there you grabbed every used uniform, towel, and smelly sock you could find. One after the next you flung them into the basket. Once all the garments were secured, you heaved the laundry basket into your bedroom. Your wide eyes flickered around the area, darting from replicator to window. There was not a single piece of clothing left in the living room that could obviously be seen.

“Computer: lock the door to the bedroom,” you commanded. As the computer chirped a reply, you threw yourself on the floor and began crawling around near the sofa. Sure enough, under the coffee table was a pair of dirty socks. You seized them with great gusto and leaned back to stand up.

_THAWACCCCCKKKK_

Clutching your head for the second time today, you refused to let the tears of pain fall. They welled at the bottom of your lashes and blurred your vision. Lying on the ground a moment longer, you took a few deep breaths to ease the throbbing in your skull. When you finally rose to your knees, you glowered at your four legged enemy, cursing his clear top and low head clearance.

“DO YOU WANT TO DIE?! **HUH!?** DO YOU?!” you yelled at the table with a shaking fist. Your foe showed no signs of fear. He merrily continued about his duties, mocking you with his glassy reflection. 

“Are you okay in there?” came a muffled voice from the door. The frustration drained from you, instantly replaced by the realization that Julian was still standing in the hallway. With one last glare at the coffee table, you tossed the socks deep under the couch to hide them from sight. Once they were successfully hidden, you walked back through the doorway, clutching your head.

“I think I got everything,” you explained with a ham-handed laugh. It only took a moment for you to realize the laugh had been a bad idea. Your nose crinkled as a twinge of pain shot to the crown of your head. Instantly, Julian’s attention was on the hand you held to your bump.

“What happened to your head?” he questioned. The tender look of concern on his face screamed retriever. Instead of a human, all you could see were sad brown eyes and droopy ears accompanied by soft dangling jowls. The tail of the imaginary dog thumped low and slow on the ground, as if to say ‘I’m so sorry for whatever I did’. It was damn near heart breaking.

You winced as another stab of pain hit you. “I had an argument with the coffee table.”

“Let me see,” he coaxed gently. You were about to say no when a twinkling worry in your fantasy dog’s face stopped the words in your throat. With the image of the adorable lab assisting him, you found yourself unwilling to refuse his examination. Reluctantly, you raised your hand and allowed the doctor to inspect your lump. You felt gentle fingers parting your hair for a better view. A tickling sensation mixed with the pain as you swallowed and looked away. After his brief assessment was complete, you felt him pull back.

“Well… will I live?” you joked, covering the bump once more. 

Bashir shook his head and smiled at you. “I would recommend you avoid fighting anymore furniture, but I think you'll make it.”

You gave Julian a lopsided grin. “Tell you what, I’ll do that if you agree not to notice anything I missed during my clean up.”

“I promise,” Bashir replied. 

As the two of you entered the room, you looked back towards the corner. Joannah, who clearly had intended to make yet another grand escape attempt, was frozen a few paces in front of her basking platform. Head erect, she flicked her tongue at the new biped. Her pupils dilated, leaving only a thin rim of gold around her eyes. As she raised her body for a charge, you quickly stepped in front of Julian. Swiftly scooping her into your arms, you explained: “She needs a few moments to acclimate to strangers.”

Joannah’s nails buried themselves in the fabric of your uniform. Her toes clutched your arms as if she was scaling a cliff face. She flicked her tongue once more, her head straining in Julian’s direction. The doctor leaned back a bit, staring at her out the corner of his eyes. You smiled at his caution.

“Please sit down.” You gestured to a chair with a nod. “She’ll calm down more once she gets to know your scent.”

You replaced Joannah on her basking platform and gave her an affectionate scratch on the side of her neck. She closed her eyes and stretched herself into your fingers. Her head rested gently on your palm and she slowly sank into your ministrations like a humanoid might sink into a warm bath.

“She’s… bigger than I expected," Bashir noted carefully. You looked down at the metre long lizard and stroked her scales tenderly. After few seconds, you slowly pulled your hand away. Joannah’s golden eyes opened again, gazing at you expectantly. You turned back to your guest.

“She’s average for her species. You should see some of the water monitors. They’ll hit three metres.” You stretched your hands wide to illustrate the point. Julian glanced back at the domestic dragon on her perch. His brows furrowed.

After a few moments Joannah raised herself just slightly. She tasted the air, cocked her head and blinked at Julian. In response, the good doctor sat up pin straight and drew his legs tight against the couch. You watched Joannah climb down head first and sway her way across the carpet like a lazy wyrm. Bashir’s pupils were just slightly dilated, his eyes fixed on the large, scaly creature who crawled ever closer. As she neared him, Joannah’s path changed. She strolled under the coffee table and peaked out at the stranger through the glass top. With halting caution, she edged her way towards Bashir’s shoes. She flicked her tongue a few times and then looked at him contemplatively. Bashir’s grip on the sofa arm tightened slightly as he stared back at the lizard. Both of them froze for just a moment as if hypnotized by the interest from the other creature. Tensions rising too fast for your taste, you stood to collect your pet. 

At that moment Joannah broke eye contact with the doctor and undulated her way back to you. Before you could seat yourself, she locked her nails into the front of your pant leg. Spikes of pain climbed your shin as you hastily unhooked her from your clothing. However, Joannah was determined. The second you set her politely on the floor she rushed right back up your pants.

“Ow ow ow!” You hissed and winced as the lizard hoisted herself into your lap. In a stately manner she planted her rump on your thigh and surveyed her domain regally. Her long tail draped over your legs as she turned half lidded eyes on Julian. Rolling your own eyes, you gently ran your fingers down her spine before moving your hand to scratch under her chin. She practically purred and leaned into the touch.

“Are you all right?” Julian asked.

“Fine, though I can’t say the same for my pants.” You gestured to the small holes in your uniform. “Her favorite hobby is burrowing in my laundry. It’s very cute until you have holes in everything you own.”

“It doesn’t look like you punish her much for it,” Julian pointed out. You looked down at your sweetheart. She cracked her eyes just a touch, flashing bronze orbs in your general direction. 

“Oh how could I get mad at her for exhibiting normal behaviors?” you cooed, scratching at a particularly itchy spot. Joannah’s eyes shut tightly and you could swear a smile appeared on her face. You coddled your baby with a full body stroke. Just near the base of her tail, the smooth cobblestone of scales was broken by a coarse patch. The words: “Ooops, found another one” escaped your mouth. You lifted the lizard into your arms and made your way to the replicator.

“Found another what?” Julian questioned, turning his upper body to watch you. From the cubby near your replicator, you grabbed a washcloth. 

“I’ll show you in a moment,” you answered. Returning your attention to the replicator, you commanded: “Computer, one cup of water, temperature setting: Joannah two.” A glowing blue light filled the replicator shelf as mug of steaming water appeared from nowhere. Cup and lizard in hand, you walked back over to your couch and placed the cloth in the water to soak.

Bashir finally seemed relaxed now that Joannah was secure. He leaned back in his chair and fanned himself lightly. “Is it a bit warm in here?”

You raised an eyebrow at your human counterpart. “I told you on the way up I need to keep it warm for her. She has full roam of the quarters when I’m home, so I like to make sure she’s comfortable.”

“Well… yes,” Bashir admitted, tugging at his collar, “but I wasn’t expecting it to be this warm.”

“If you think this is warm, stick your hand under the basking spot. It’s 45C.” You smiled indulgently at your pet, rubbing the warm rag gently on her tail. Slowly, the patch loosened under your tender care. “Nice and toasty, right sweetie?”

Julian looked between you and your lizard, the corner of his lips twitching upward into a soft grin. “So the purpose of the water is…?”

“Oh!” You scratched the back of your head and awkwardly tried to compensate for your horrible memory. “It softens up the stuck shed.”

Bashir leaned forward just a bit. “Does that happen a lot?”

“No, I think the travel messed with her. She only has a bad shed if she gets stressed out.” You allowed you hands to run over all of Joannah’s body, searching for more flaking patches. Along her elbow you found another rough piece. The cloth went back into the cup, moistening it once again. 

Julian glanced from the mug, to Joannah to you. “How often do you need to do this?”

You removed your cloth from the cup and rubbed gentle circles into Joannah’s forelimb. “I’ve been working on removing it for a few days now. Every time I see her I check her over.”

“So... when you touched Garak... you were removing shed?”

Instantly, the entire scene replayed in your mind. You could see the tea, your hands, the white skin and Garak’s mortified face all rolled into a ball of whirling remembrance. Your stomach knotted and your chest tightened. Every muscle in your body clenched as blood rushed to your head. The crimson liquid colored your face in a hot, glowing scarlet. Solemnly, you bowed your head in disgrace.

“Yeah…” you squeaked and reflexively squeezed Joannah’s elbow. Indignant, she gave you a warning tap with her open snout. You loosened your grip. “He… um...had a piece stuck by his ear. I guess I was running on autopilot.”

A pregnant pause filled the room, your humiliation crushing the conversation with its weight. You found yourself sinking deeply into the couch cushion, wishing you were invisible. Across the coffee table, Bashir leaned forward even more. You didn’t have to look up to know he was watching you; you could feel his stare. You glanced up at him, only to find a painfully wide grin plastered across his face. You watched a small tremor start in his shoulders. It trailed down his body, shaking him from the chest on up. He brought a hand to his mouth to stifle the oncoming noises, but it was too late. With great gusto, Julian burst out cackling.

“I never even noticed Cardassians shed before!” Julian heaved with laughter. You brought a palm to your face and groaned loudly. At this point you wished a black hole would appear out of nowhere and consume you. You squirmed in your seat, trying to look anywhere but at Bashir. It took the longest five seconds of your life for your companion to get himself under control. When he finally managed to contain himself to a smug, consoling voice, Julian added: “I’m sure Garak will understand once I explain it.”

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” you murmured. All your uncomfortable shifting seemed to disturb Joannah. At once, you felt the beast in your lap move. Looking rather indignant, she crawled her way back down your pant leg and waddled over to the hide by the bathroom. You were very sure that if lizards could huff, your little-miss-princess would have. Julian refocused his attention onto the retreating reptile. 

“So, has she warmed up to me?” he questioned hesitantly.

“Well, she hasn’t tried to bite you so that’s a start,” you joked.

Julian sat up a little straighter. “Does she bite... _often_?”

You frowned for a moment and tried to remember the last incident. As soon as you recalled it, you grimaced. “Not since my last date tried to impress me. He was looming over her, and she already didn’t like him.”

The doctor’s skin seemed a bit paler than before as he inspected Joannah’s broad jaws and powerful tail. “What happened?” he asked quietly.

“Oh, just a few bite wounds. Nothing a dermal regenerator couldn’t fix…” you muttered. Under your breath you added: “Unfortunately.”

A peculiar expression crossed Dr. Bashir’s face. “Just a few?” he stammered. He raised his eyebrows dubiously and frowned through tightly closed lips. Giving Joannah the hairy eyeball, he very slowly scooted himself across the couch. 

Your eyes went wide as you waved your hands vigorously in front of you. “Oh no!” you explained, shaking your head. “I promise she’s really gentle. She hardly ever attacks anyone.”

The look on Julian’s face reminded you of a retriever whose anal glands needed expressing. The dog would come into the appointment willingly, wagging its tail and slobbering all over you. When you put it on the lift table it would be unsure, but still trust you. By the time you got your latex gloves on, the Lab would giving you whale eye **[1]**. The minute you lifted its tail, the dog would have had quite enough of that for one day thank you very much. As Joannah turned her head around to sniff at Julian again, you saw the bulging betrayed eyes that came right before the frantic scramble to escape. Julian was on his feet before Joannah’s tongue could return to her mouth.

“I need to get back to work,” Bashir explained, giving your lizard a wide berth. Walking more stiffly than a man with sudden diarrhea, he made a beeline for the door. You leapt to your feet and chased after him. When he reached the arch, Julian glanced over at Joannah one more time. She lifted herself up a bit and stared straight at him. The two locked eyes, both freezing under the others gaze.

“I think she likes you,” you lied, laughing awkwardly. 

“Um… well, that’s good.” Bashir still eyed your lizard as if she could spit acid. Without taking his anxious gaze off of her he said: “I’ll see you later.”

“Right,” you nodded. Bashir returned the gesture and was out the door faster than you could say Herpetophobia. The moment the doors hissed shut, you stamped your foot and dug your fingers into your hair. You whirled around, wincing at your own stupidity.

“Dumbass!” you shouted at yourself. The cry echoes slightly in your empty room. “You and your big mouth really cocked it up this time! Now who are you going to get to socialize Joannah to men!?” Joannah sauntered her way around the couch and blinked up at you. You groaned, and shook your head at your pet. “Today was disaster and it’s not even 1330.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **[1]** Whale eye is a body language cue that indicates fear or apprehension in dogs. When a dog pulls away from a negative stimulus, they often turn their head as a sign of nonaggression and disinterest in conflict. However, as the stimulus is still very frightening, the dog does not take their eye off the threat. If the dog is unable to flea and starts to display whale eye, it can be a sign of an imminent bite. Remember: **wherever the dog is looking is where his teeth will go if he decides to bite**. If he’s looking at your face, you better back up. Other signs of fear and anxiety include lip licking, tightened muscles, closed/clamped jaw, yawning (a self-calming behavior), panting (in the absence ~~abscess~~ of heat or exercise), moving in slow motion, tucked tail, and cowering. 
> 
> [An awesome body language chart by Dr. Sophia Yin](http://info.drsophiayin.com/Portals/13722/docs/SYBodyLanguagePoster8.5sm%5B1%5D.pdf)
> 
> [My dog displaying whale eye.](http://i1304.photobucket.com/albums/s525/Alldoctorswornandweary/6ee1d21d-2a99-4813-9bda-e1b1cca45b38_zpsdd299b4c.jpg?t=1393423555) Despite what my dog may insist, nail trims are not lethal and he was not harmed.
> 
>  **Author's note:** Right after I posted this Geckomama pointed out that I wrote "abscess" instead of "absence". This is what studying too much does to your brain. I left it in for your entertainment.


	9. The Unofficial History of Star Trek Vets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Author's Note:** Well folks... today is my birthday! I'm officially a [ Christmas Cake](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ChristmasCake) now, but (if I may permitted a moment to bask in my greatness) I'm still looking _fine_. So for my 1/4 of a century birthday, I figured all you lovely readers out there deserved a present too. Welcome to the crash course in "The Unofficial History of Star Trek Veterinarians" endorsed by two very sleep deprived vet students. Enjoy. :3
> 
>  **Bonus:** To celebrate our 100 (now over 150) views, **Geckomama** was wonderfully awesome and made this fantastic fanart.[ Thank you all so much for all the views!](http://i1304.photobucket.com/albums/s525/Alldoctorswornandweary/10010766_10101901777499532_457356917_o_zpsdf70b0ff.jpg).

“Oh there you are!” Dax exclaimed excitedly as you entered the main science lab. “I was beginning to think Julian would never let you go.”

You said nothing as you dragged yourself to the nearest chair and fell into it. With a resigned sigh, you snatched up the PADD containing the latest medical scans of your voles and tried to lose yourself in it. You could feel Dax examining you pale face, puffy eyes and defeated expression. Your cold embarrassment clashed against the warm cheerfulness that she radiated. Where the two collided, a swirl of concern blew its way across the room.

Dax raised both eyebrows and stood up. “What happened?”

You looked up and saw Dax’s comforting Golden Retriever face again. The Dax-Dog daydream tilted its head at you. Its black button eyes welled over with concern. As Dax moved to your side, you swore you could hear the “foom-foom” of a feather tail gliding around the consul.

You voice was barely audible as you mumbled: “I really messed up.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” Dax asked, placing a gentle hand on your shoulder. The imaginary dog rested its head in your lap, brows twitching upwards to softly stare into your eyes. You surrendered to that face just like you had two weeks ago.

“Joannah, my lizard... has been shedding. Garak had a piece of stuck shed on his face. I guess I was just on autopilot and I kinda… sorta… removed it for him.”

Dax blinked at you. “And…?”

You looked her straight in the eyes. “How would you feel if some random person came up and groomed you without your permission?”

Realization finally hit Dax’s face. “Ah…”

You propped your elbows on the consul and rested your face in your hands. “I tried to apologize, but only succeeded in dumping my tea all over the table.” You shook your head dejectedly at the memory. “Julian said he’d talk to Garak. Then Julian wanted to meet my lizard. While he was visiting, stupid me went and told him that Joannah attacks people. Now he’s all freaked out too,” you groaned. “Me and my big mouth just don’t know when to quit.”

You felt a small squeeze from the hand at your shoulder. “Garak is a pretty easy going guy,” Dax comforted. Her voice was more calming than petting a puppy by a warm fire. “And Julian is tougher than he looks. This will all blow over.” 

“I hope so…” you moaned, sinking further into your palms.

"Hey, don't worry. Everybody messes up sometimes.” Dax made her way back to her side of the consul. She took a seat and began to type again. “Curzon Dax, my last host, was an ambassador and he screwed up worse than that, more than once."

You looked up. "How?" 

Dax crossed her legs and leaned back into her chair with a smile. She folded her hands neatly in her lap, eyes glittering with dubious intentions. "Curzon was at a state dinner with representatives of the Klingon Empire when he sat down next to a very attractive Klingon Lady. Curzon, being quite the Playboy, just poured on the charm. He thought she was quite taken with him.”

You raised one eyebrow at your comrade. "Well, was she?"

"Oh she was taken all right.” Dax broke out into a beaming smile. She raised her eyebrow and nodded knowingly. “By the time the Klingon Ambassador arrived, Curzon was in full swing. He gallantly introduced the ambassador to ‘Lady Godar, a woman of immeasurable wit and beauty’.” Dax shook her head, and you leaned in to hear the end of the story. She finished with: “The ambassador replied ‘yes, my wife certainly is’."

"Oh hell, that’s bad,” you commented, eyes alight and grinning so wide it hurt. While Dax’s words couldn’t lift all the weight of your stress, the ache in your neck faded as your muscles relaxed. Maybe you could get past this.

"No kidding,” Dax laughed. “Curzon talked pretty fast to fix that. It nearly created an interplanetary incident."

"Well, that certainly beats mine,” you joked. You set down your pad, a big smile on your face. “The only story I have that’s nearly as embarrassing is ‘creepy lab guy’ from vet school.” You hoped she would ask; it was one of the best anecdotes you had.

"Creepy lab guy?" Dax questioned, resting an elbow on the consul. She leaned into her hand, resting the flat edge of her palm near her spot line. “That sounds like a good story. Do tell!”

“Oh, with pleasure,” you agreed. You leaned back in your chair, crossing your arms. "Junior year my Betazoid friend, Milana, comes to me a bit worried. She told me some guy she didn't know kept trying to talk to her. Being a telepath she could tell right away the guy was interested in her, but she didn't like him.”

“Isn’t that always how it goes?” Dax chimed in knowingly.

“Right?” you agreed. You could still picture Milana’s black eyes rolling as she talked about her would be admirer. “So finally, she told him, very bluntly, she wasn't interested. He told her he'd be free if she changed her mind. The problem was he kept bugging her.”

Dax shook her head in sympathy. "Ah, the old ‘no means try harder’ bit.”

You nodded. Milana had about the same negative reaction to the continued attention as Dax. "So anyway, I tell her we'll talk after my lab. The minute I get there, my lab partner is all excited. He starts talking about this girl he's going to ask out."

"Oh no….” Dax mouth formed a pursed ‘O’ shape as she closed her eyes and grimaced laughingly. You grinned broadly. The set-up of the situation was every bit as comedic as it sounded.

You faked a deep sigh, mockingly imitating the oblivious subject of your story. "He figures he came on too fast the first time and that she's just shy.” You raised a finger to really emphasize the lecturing tone he had taken with you during the conversation. “So he'd decided to give her a week to think about it harder. ‘Girls sometimes just need time’, dontcha know?”

Dax let her jaw drop with a mix of amusement and disbelief. "Seriously?" she demanded.

"Well, I just couldn't help myself because I'm an asshole like that,” you shrugged. “I asked him who it was. Sure enough it was Milana. So I said: ‘are you sure you want to go out with her? I mean, Betazoids are _soooooooo_ emotional’."

"Oh no,” Dax laughed.

By this point, you were making grand gestures with your arms. Your eyes glittered with excitement, voice raising several decibels. "I mean, how did he even know that what he was feeling is real? What if he just picked up on her projecting her emotions. Or worse, what if she was _manipulating_ him to like her? Maybe she was just some sadist that got off on turning guys down."

Dax leaned forward even further, deeply engrossed in the story. "What did he say?" she questioned breathlessly.

You closed your eyes and leaned back into the chair with a smug grin. "He seemed to think about that for a long time. Finally, he decided Milana was just too temperamental for him."

Dax leaned back just a bit, seemingly satisfied. "Well that worked out."

“Oh it gets better,” you insisted. You leaned forward again, beckoning for her to rejoin the conversation. Dax cocked her head quizzically and mirrored your pose. “You see, the next day he found a new girl who was much less emotional: my best friend, T'kel."

“A Vulcan?!” Jadzia gasped gleefully. You nodded to confirm her thoughts. She slowly shook her head from side to side, the world’s largest smile on her face. "But Vulcans have arranged marriages!”

“Oh yes they do!” Your smile was more wicked than a man with a handlebar mustache and a set of train tracks. “T'kel turned him down,” You made a grand ‘ta-da’ wave and smirked crookedly at Jadzia. “That decline was colder than a Breen icicle.”

Jadzia was absolutely beside herself at this point. The two of you howled with laughter, cackling in synchrony. The loud whoops filled the lab, ringing off the metal walls. The door to the lab opened and you could see a crewman staring blankly at the two of you. You pointed to him, totally unable to get a word out. Jadzia looked up and waved him off. The crewman took a step backwards and walked out of the lab even more confused than when he came in. In response, Jadzia threw her head back and roared.

After about fifteen solid seconds, you wiped a few stray tears of mirth from your eyes and gasped to catch your breath. You added: “The good news was that since Milana and T'kel were friends, he was too embarrassed to ask her out again."

"That’s one way to solve a problem." Jadzia’s face was bright red, as she leaned on her the consul for support. “Sounds like you guys had a lot of fun in school.”

You nodded at first, but certain bad memories quickly came to you. A shadow fell over your face and you smiled weakly. Quietly you muttered: "Yeah, vet school was fun when we weren't selling our souls competing for jobs."

Jadzia cocked her head and raised a brow, totally perplexed. "Wait…” she drawled. “I know Julian was doing all the animal work before you got here. If you were competing for jobs, why was he having such a hard time getting you?”

You shrugged. “It’s kinda a long history lesson…”

“Tell me anyways!” she replied exuberantly. 

“Well… it all started about the time food synthesizers and holodecks came into existence,” you explained.

“Food synthesizers and holodecks?” Jadzia questioned.

You nodded. “You see, there are basically four jobs for veterinarians: general practice, laboratory medicine, animal product inspection, and disease control. General practice is the one everybody with a pet knows. Laboratory medicine focuses on keeping all animals in research settings healthy and environmentally enriched. The other job of laboratory vets is to ensure that animals are handled safely and with due respect.”

Dax smiled at you. “I know who lab vets are. I work with lab vets.”

You scratched your cheek sheepishly, a slight blush crossing your face. Of course Dax knew what lab vets were. That was dumb. Why were you always giving too much information? You really needed to remember to shut up sometimes.

Dax’s next words broke you out of your self deprecating loop; “Then animal inspection is for animals that are being imported?” she speculated. 

“Kinda…” you muttered, shrugging at the lieutenant. “but it’s more than that. Animal inspection includes any animal products such as wool and meat or eggs. The main goal of that branch is to prevent diseases from entering the Federation. If an outbreak occurs, you get to see the fourth type in action. The disease control vets are usually part of Starfleet and the Federation government. Their job is to work with all the other veterinarians, and sometimes humanoid doctors, to stop the spread of disease.”

A sudden look of realization crossed Dax’s face. “Right!” she agreed, popping her first into the palm of her hand excitedly. “My first host was a council member in the Trill government. She worked with that type of veterinarian during a plague on Trill.”

You brought a flat hand to your lips, eyes crinkling as you giggled politely at the Trill’s overwhelming, genuine, enthusiasm. Dax teasingly stuck her tongue out at you, causing you to break into a louder chuckle. She winked at you, snickering herself as her perfectly white teeth grinned around the fleshy pink muscle. The look on her sculpted face reminded you of a devious puppy that had slipped its leash. On and on it lead its frustrated followers, bouncing merrily through a muddy field while its owners screamed something about “just got a bath”. The picture of Jadzia playing outside on a warm sunny day seemed to fit her just so. This was a woman who would never lose sight of how to have fun. Clownishly, you returned the gesture in kind and wrinkled your nose at the woman across the consul. She beamed at your proudly.

Finally, coming down from your unprofessional playtime, you continued your long explanation. “When food synthesizers came into use at the start of the 23rd century, people stopped eating real animal products. After all, why eat steak when a synthetic steak appears faster and didn’t involve killing an animal.”

“Yeah…” Dax agreed reluctantly, crossing her legs. “but they don’t taste as good as real steak.”

 

“Neither does steak that’s been through the transporter,” you laughed, swinging your swivel chair slightly from side to side. “That’s why food animals still have to be shipped like they were before transporters. Even the milk tastes different if you use a transporter beam on a cow.” You shook your head. “All that said, it wasn’t different enough for most people to care. So the food animal business took a nose dive and ¾ of the large animal veterinarians disappeared with it. Those that were left took care of things like racing horses and show cattle.”

“Oh...” Jadzia was wide eyed the moment you mentioned the statistics. You looked away, staring at the wall. 

Unbidden, the tragic stories of those times whispered painfully in your ears. You could only imagine how useless the old guard felt, sitting idle by the phone, waiting for any break in the silent moratorium. Your heart sank with the country veterinarians, still traveling the back roads in beat up old vehicles gazing blankly at empty fields where cattle used to graze. Slowly, they’d turn their faces away, staring ahead so hard they could almost block out the hollow feeling of ennui coursing coldly through their veins. Night after night they would lie awake in bed, eyes burning with shame they’d never share with anyone but another member of their ilk. In tiny rooms across the globe, they sought empathy from their comrades and sympathy from the bottom of a bottle. What little conversation there was to be had was nothing but nods of agreement and mutterings of concealed misery. No matter how well the Federation provided for all its citizens needs, it could never replace the loss of purpose, the feeling of worthlessness. No veterinarian could ever be sated unless they worked themselves to the bone. It simply wasn’t in the nature of your profession to do nothing. 

Swallowing down the ache in your throat, you continued: “Then the holosimulations became available to laboratories around five years ago. Laboratory veterinarians had been trying to use replacements for animal models for years because their goal is to limit the number of live animals in labs. Now we had a very realistic way to run models without live animals. No animals, no veterinarians needed. Everyone remembered the ‘large animal layoffs’ over a century ago, so they all panicked. Within three years, the laboratory field dropped off to almost nothing because everyone thought they’d lose their job. When I entered school, being a research vet was career suicide.”

“I never even thought of that…” Dax muttered. “So, did people just move to interspecies veterinary medicine in Starfleet?”

“How could we?” You sighed, gripping the armrests of your chair and leaning deep into your seat. “For every one humanoid species there are hundreds of thousands of mammals, reptiles, fish and birds. If you include invertebrates, the numbers get even more insane. There are just too many species for any veterinarian to know. As a result, each of the planets maintained their own veterinarians. There was no reason for Starfleet to keep veterinarians when they could just go to a local who had more experience. No, we all jumped ship to pet animal care and the field got flooded very quickly.”

All of a sudden Jadzia’s eyebrows furrowed together and she shot you a confused look. “But your friend is a lab vet and I still have to get all my research with animals approved by a veterinarian.”

You shifted, somewhat embarrassed by your predecessors overreaction. “Yeah, that was a miscalculation on the part of the profession. They were still so hurt from the food animal fallout that they couldn’t see anything but the worst case scenario.” You smiled weakly and scratched the back of your head. “As it happened, just like battle sims aren’t like real battle, research simulations can’t cover every single real life problem you face. After the ‘great panic’ people realized that laboratory vets were still going to be needed. In the end, they made a fast comeback because we needed animal models and people to look after them.”

“And we still use the holodecks to run simulations before we start.” Jadiza concluded, finishing your sentence.

“Yes,” you confirmed. “While we can’t avoid working with animal models, it allows us to perfect our procedures before even considering a live model. It’s really reduced the number of animals and greatly increased the safety margins for the rest.”

“What about the food animal veterinarians?”

“Actually, we were saved by the taste of replicated food,” you explained. “Once the novelty wore off, people started to get picky about their meat, milk, and cheese. Some of my old professors were alive right at the tail end of the fallout. They’re the only ones who remember what it was like. It took them years to fill all the vacancies once demand for animal products rose again.”

You kicked your feet along the floor, frowning to yourself. A familiar ball of hopelessness stuck at the base of your throat as you thought about your job search. You shook your head, chasing the emotions away. Like ghostly shadows they retreated to the edges of your mind, waiting in pools of darkness for the light of your control to fade. Quickly, you continued your explanation before the memories could overwhelm you again.

“The other thing that saved us was people wanted to try the dishes from other words. For example, many of the Klingon dishes require importation of animal products. To help the food inspectors on every planet, Starfleet is, very slowly, stationing veterinarians on all the spaceports to run health checks. The vets they want need to be able to work with just about anything that comes through the door. That’s why they can’t just hire locals anymore. They really need people with experience in interspecies vet med, like me.”

Dax still seemed very confused as she gestured you onward “And there just aren’t many interspecies veterinarians?”

“Actually, we’re coming out of a time period when there just weren’t many veterinarians in general. When ½ the jobs in your profession disappear, the schools start running out of students. No students means no need for the school, so it folds. When we lost all those food animal jobs we also lost over ½ the schools. In the last century we’ve only opened two new schools on Earth. Building a good program takes time. Starfleet can’t even get their own school together, and they’ve been arguing about it for ten years.”

“So, now there just aren’t enough vets to go around?”

You shook your head. “Forty years ago, that was the case. My generation is the first group where food, lab, and pet animal jobs are all highly competitive. There are plenty of veterinarians on Earth; the problem is nobody wants to leave Earth.”

“Because they don’t want to work on species they aren’t familiar with?”

You stopped for moment, lost in thought. You could picture the little children who came to the vet school for field trips. Most of them were familiar with the doctor who fixed their dog, and you got lots of attention for that. However, in their lifetime, cattle, sheep, chickens, goats and pigs were just now becoming ‘normal’ again. None of those children had grown up on a farm. Besides, even adults don’t think about the doctor for the animal on their dinner plate. Worse yet, no kid even understood what a laboratory vet was, let alone that they could become one.

“It’s also a matter of inspiration,” you explained. “Since general practice is all kids are exposed to, that’s all they want to be. Even if new schools opened, they always have a harder time getting students for any other field. Heck, T’Kel was the only one of my friends who went into research and that’s because she’s a Vulcan; research is highly regarded there and that’s what inspired her as a kid.”

Dax looked at you solemnly. “So basically, everyone wants to stay on their home world as general practice vets and no one wants to work with other species because the number of animals is just too overwhelming?”

“Exactly,” you confirmed. “Now that interplanetary trade of animal products is expanding Starfleet is clamoring for animal inspectors and they can’t find any. They tried to cope by letting the humanoid doctors work on animals when no veterinarian could be found, but-”

Dax cut you off with another series of intense cackles. You raised an eyebrow as she clutched her gut and gripped the back of her chair for support. She wiped the tears from her face and waved you off the topic. “Say no more!” she gasped between bursts of laughter. “I remember Julian’s very short stint as a veterinarian. He put in the request for you right after he tried to vaccinate Ensign Martinez’s cats.” At these words, Dax doubled over again. It was a solid three seconds before she could add: “He was so relieved when you got assigned here before Baubles was due again.”

You smiled sheepishly. “Kinda ironic that he was competing for me.”

Coming down from her fit, Dax barely managed: “How so?”

“Well… I didn’t really want to be an inspector. I was all set to be an exotic general practice veterinarian.”

“Then how did you end up here?”

You grimaced at the thought of your job interviews. Waiting weeks for calls that would never come. Hoping against hope that maybe your low GPA and unusually long externship mid sophomore year really didn’t mean that much to future employers. Attending interviews where you competed against the top ten members of your class; watching every classmate look so much more confident than you. Congratulating T’kel on her new position, while guiltily wishing it had been you to get that job, any job. The look on your sister’s face as she comfortingly patted your shoulder and told you: ‘they don’t know what they’re missing’. The feeling of relief and defeat when the Starfleet recruiter knocked on your door, asking for you by name. The heavy weight of sadness when you boarded the freighter, knowing you’d be light years away from home for at least a decade of military service. You shook your head, trying to rid yourself of the swirling torrent of emotions. You only succeeded in silencing them. They still hovered like vultures circling a carcass.

You folded your hands in your lap and put on a fake smile. “Since I wanted to work with exotics, I did a long externship with a veterinarian at Federation Importation Services. When I applied for jobs, Starfleet got really excited about that experience, and they made the best offer.”

Truthfully Starfleet made the only offer, but Jadzia didn’t need to know that.

“Well,” Jadiza stated, with a small smile. “For what it’s worth, I’m glad you’re here.”

As Jadzia refocused on her work, you glanced over at her. With her eyes off your face, you finally allowed the false smile to fade. It was rapidly replaced with the tired, depressed frown of a person who knew rejection better than acceptance. No matter how happy Jadzia was to have you here, you knew you would never be as content as if you had been a smarter person with a better GPA. Some people say “shoot for the moon and you’ll at least end up among the stars”. What those idiots don’t realize is that there is an awful lot of dead space between those stars where people can also land. You were just lucky you caught a runaway comet instead of floating in an endlessly cold night for all eternity.

“Me too,” you lied, picking up your PADD again.


	10. Buttons and Baubles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey everybody! Long time to post. Geckomama just reminded me (like one hour ago) I was writing a story. She quickly helped me re-edit this and _bam_ , it's done. Isn't she awesome?!
> 
> I'm in the middle of writing chapter 17 and we're working on beta-ing chapter 11. Eleven might take some more time than usual because poor Julian was suffering from inconsistent writing. Hopefully we'll have that resolved soon!
> 
> A super huge thank you to you readers! I can't believe how many hits this story has acquired. I feel like Ferengi who just earned their first profit! (Geckomama fed me that line as we were waiting for class to start). Any way... Much cheer! Happy reading! Love you all!
> 
> **Full Stop Ensign!** We just hit 200 views! WOOHOOO! In honor of this momentous occasion, the Great and Powerful Geckomama has made another awesome fanart! [From the right: T'kel (Vulcan), Herriot (Human), Milana (Betazoid), Crimsoncat (Orion), Geckomama (Cardassian)](http://i1304.photobucket.com/albums/s525/Alldoctorswornandweary/10153181_10101926615154672_112562432_n_zpsdf5ecd48.jpg). Yes we know... there are no Cardassians in Starfleet. Doesn't matter. Still having fun! Cheers everyone!

The sound of your heartbeat pounded in your ears with every heavy footfall from your shoes. Your sealed tumbler of double Raktajino sloshed as you weaved between a group of Bajoran tourists. As you ducked past Morn, you wondered how in the world he was up at 0910. You didn't even want to be up right now, which is partially why you were already late for your first appointment.

“No running on the promenade, Doctor!” an authoritative voice commanded from the second level. You glanced up and saw Odo leaning over the edge of the platform to leer frustratedly at you. His fingers gripped the railing so hard you were concerned he might dent the metal.

“I’m not running, I’m power-walking!” you called back, slowing down just slightly as you hit the doors to Sickbay. 

As the entry way wooshed closed you felt your stomach do a summersault. It was by sheer willpower alone that you kept your coffee down. You glanced around the room, chest heaving from your morning jog. As always, Dr. Bashir was the only doctor in the ward. He looked up from his medical records as you doubled over and breathed heavily by the entrance.

Julian raised an eyebrow. "Slept through your alarm?" he asked

You shook your head and panted: "No... Woke up... Turned off... Fell back asleep..." 

As you sucked in air, the cool, dehumidified atmosphere of the space station wreaked havoc on your mucus membranes. You felt a dry itching building in your throat. It tickled its way up your trachea leaving a burning ache behind it. Finally, you couldn’t take it anymore and broke into a group of loud, dry coughs. You covered your mouth and hacked violently into your elbow. Bringing the tumbler to your left hand, you opened the top. You felt some of the drink spilling onto the sleeve of your uniform. Body shaking from the coughing fit; you brought the tumbler to your mouth and took a large slug of coffee. With your throat moistened, you finally stopped hacking. You wiped your mouth on your sleeve and strode purposely towards the portable Vet Medkit in the pharmacy. Snatching the grey box from the drawer, you made for the door while still clutching your caffeine crutch.

"Are you sleeping okay?" Julian questioned from his chair. You paused by the door and shot him a pointed look. He was eyeing the extra large beverage in your hand.

Unlike you, Dr. Bashir probably got a full eight hours of sleep last night. You, however, had lain awake in bed until 0430, worrying about the voles. It had been a full six weeks since you first arrived on the station and their breeding season was in full swing. Images of the hairless pests had rattled around your brain making it fully impossible to relax. It was only after dosing yourself with a hypospray of sleep aids that you were finally able to turn off your mind for a meager four hours of rest. That was why you had fallen back asleep after turning off your alarm this morning.

"Can we have this conversation when I'm not busy?" you protested.

"You're always busy," Bashir returned.

"You don't _say_?" you taunted sarcastically. Before Julian could make you any more late to your appointment, you bustled out the door.

 

Not ten minutes later, you found yourself crawling around the floor of Ensign Martinez's quarters, trying to catch a glimpse of your patient. Under the sofa you saw the glowing red eyes of your quarry, flashing in your direction. A warning growl rumbled across the floor, clearly indicating that Mr. Baubles was in no mood for games. You sighed and shook your head at the Ensign. Her deep chocolate eyes gave you the most understanding look as she clutched a lilac point Siamese, Buttons, in her tanned arms. Button’s pupils were completely dilated, her irises nothing more than thin slits of blue rimming the edges of the orbs. You peered under the sofa one more time only to be rewarded with a shrieking wail from the ensconced seal point Siamese.

“Well…” you huffed in defeat. “Clearly, Baubles has a nasty case of White Coat Syndrome.”

Martinez frowned at you quizzically. “White Coat Syndrome?” 

You sat up, scooting few steps away from the couch. Keeping a light, soft tone you explained: “He’s afraid of doctors.”

“I think he knows you’re here to give him his vaccines,” she responded with a weary smile. “He doesn’t like the air puff from the hypospray.”

“No cat does. I honestly think we were better off with needles,” you muttered. 

“Would you like me to go get the gloves?”

You blinked in confusion. “The gloves?”

“Oh yes, Doctor Bashir gave them to me for Baubles,” she explained. Buttons shifted slightly in her owner’s arms, burying a whiskered face in Martinez’s gold and black uniform. It took you a moment to realize that Martinez was on the station the last time the cats were vaccinated. All the anxiety in these animals really made you wonder how Dr. Bashir had coped with his temporary post as “the next best thing to a vet”. It was about time you got to see it firsthand.

“Yes, why don’t you go get them,” you agreed, rising to stand. Your knees cracked loudly on the way up, eliciting another hiss from Baubles. “I want to see how they were handled before I got here.”

Without setting down Buttons, Ensign Martinez walked into her bedroom. Over a low growl from beneath the couch, you heard a drawer open and close. When the Ensign returned to the room, she brought a pair of very thick brown leather gloves. The fingers were rounded and bulky, totally useless for fine motor movements. The leather itself was moderately worn and appeared to have multiple punctures in it. Through holes in the outer fabric you could see some sort of woven grey material. Martinez handed you the gloves with one hand, supporting her cat with the other. As you took them from her you realized the gloves were made of armored mesh. Suddenly, the look Garak and Bashir had exchanged when Baubles’ name came up made sense. 

“Doctor Bashir usually puts these on and drags him out from under the sofa when Baubles is being mean .”

You set the gloves on the coffee table and frowned. Martinez’s single statement explained a lot. No wonder Baubles was hissing and spitting like an over-boiled kettle. You’d be terrified too if some giant person chased you down, dragged you out of hiding and ‘tortured’ you with loud scary noises. After all, paranoia is only paranoia until someone attacks you. If Baubles already believed that Doctors were evil, rough handling like that would only convince him he was right. Thanks to Dr. Bashir, Baubles probably felt everyone with a Medkit was out to kill him. It certainly made sense that he would adopt an ‘attack first, ask questions later’ approach to Doctors. 

Now… how to gently break this to Baubles’ owner.

You gestured for the Ensign to sit down. “How did Baubles behave at the vet when he was younger?”

“He used to be so good when he was younger,” Martinez told you as she took a seat at her dining table. “He would curl up in my arms and let them give the hypospray, just like Buttons here.”

“I’m a bit worried about her too…” you trailed off and looked at Buttons skeptically. Her stiff, tensed body and visible tremors read nothing but unadulterated terror. Clearly, Buttons wasn’t ‘good’ right now as much as she was ‘paralyzed with fear’. “You see how Buttons eyes are really big and her tail is tucked in? Those are actually signs of fear in a cat.”

“Right, I know that,” Martinez replied dismissively. “But Baubles isn’t afraid anymore. Now he’s just cranky.”

Behind you Baubles had quieted down. You peaked under the couch to make sure he was still alive. Another hiss politely informed you that Mr. Baubles was not only alive, but perfectly content to remove any limb that came within striking distance. Satisfied that your patient had not died of a heart attack, you returned your attention to his owner. As you examined Ensign Martinez’s face, you could only find furrowed brows and deep frustration. You rubbed your temples and sighed. This was going to be a _long_ conversation. How best to start?

“You know, we humans are lucky,” you commented. “When we’re scared of another humanoid we can just say so. Since cats don’t have a structured language like ours, they have to communicate with their bodies instead.”

Ensign Martinez cocked her head slightly and stared at you. Good, you had her attention.

“For example, showing that frightened body language is how cats say ‘you’re scary, please leave me alone’. That works pretty well for other cats, but humans aren’t used to reading cat language. Worse yet, we don’t understand why they’re so scared of something that we know isn’t harmful. I know more than once I’ve wished I could just sit down and explain to them what was going on.”

“Me too,” Martinez agreed.

“However, since they can’t understand us, they get more scared and start to hiss. Hissing is the cat equivalent of screaming. Baubles isn’t hissing to be mean to me, he is hissing because he’s terrified of me.”

“Oh my gosh….” Martinez eyes popped wide open at your words. As she glanced over to the couch her brows softened and her face held a mix of confusion and concern. “But if he’s scared, why does he attack people?”

Memories from your animal behavior externship slowly came back to you. You recalled the doctor speaking to clients in stories to explain their pet’s behavior. She told you that, in order for owners to sympathize with their pet, they needed to relate to the emotions of the animal. If the owner couldn't relate, they'd just see a "mean" aggressive animal. Putting "fear based aggression" in humanoid terms such as "terror filled reaction toward an aggressor" was the best way to help people understand how their animal felt, and why the pet “attacked”.

You folded your hands in front of you and smiled sadly at the ensign. “Imagine you are walking home late one night when a person starts to follow you. You ask them to leave you alone, they ignore you. You scream for help, and they keep following you. You run away and hide, but they find you and try to drag you out of your hiding space. You don’t know what they want because they don’t speak the same language. All you know is that they just keep coming. What would you do?”

Martinez’s eyes shifted down to inspect the cat in her arms. Her frown deepened as she stroked Buttons behind the ear. For her part, Buttons stayed as still as a sculpture. “I would probably start fighting for my life,” the Ensign muttered. 

You nodded encouragingly. “That’s what’s happening here. Baubles can’t understand that we just want to give him a vaccine. All he knows is that a scary person with a med kit drags him out of hiding and ‘attacks’ him with this horrible noise maker. Baubles thinks he needs to fight for his life.”

Martinez looked at the sofa thoughtfully. “Is there any way we can convince him you aren’t here to harm him?” she questioned quietly.

“Yes, there is," you confirmed with a grin. Now that you had client understanding the situation, the second hardest part was done. It was time to discuss treatment. “I can bribe him to like me.”

“Bribe him?”

“When I was a kid I was scared of the doctor. They used to poke me all over and they smelled funny.” You exaggeratedly shuddered at the thought, shifting in your seat. “However, I always put up with it because I got a sucker on the way out of the doctor’s office. No matter who you are or what language you speak, most everybody likes food. I’m going to convince Baubles to put up with me because I’ll bring him treats.”

Another low growl echoed from under the couch. Both you and Martinez looked over at the sofa. You frowned at your hidden patient. Martinez looked skeptical.

“Will that work?” she asked cautiously.

You smiled sheepishly. “Do you remember the story of Pavlov?”

“He was that researcher who accidentally trained the dogs to salivate every time a bell rang.”

You nodded. "And we’re going to teach Buttons and Baubles that every time I walk into your quarters, they get awesome, super special treats. Then, I walk away and do nothing else to them."

"Oh... So that they start to get excited about you visiting because you’ll always have food?"

Exactly!" you confirmed. "Now, what is something that Baubles really likes but isn’t allowed to have?”

“Food?" Martinez's eyes rolled to the side and her nose wrinkled. She pushed her thick waves of dark brown hair behind her ear and pouted slightly. "Well I feed him cat food, but he really likes cheese.”

You could feel the excitement building within you. You had never expected you would get to work with a behavior case in Starfleet; most of your patients were just passing through. This was where you really could make things easier on yourself and help an animal. This was the opportunity you'd always wanted. You could make a difference.

“All right then." You beamed."Here’s what we’ll do. For the next few weeks I’m going to come by to visit once or twice a day. I’m going to bring pea sized pieces of mozzarella for Baubles and Buttons. We don’t want to give them any more than that tiny bit because they could get an upset stomach. For this to work, I’m the only person who can feed them cheese. After all, if I got the sucker and didn’t have to go to the doctor, I never would have. The cheese needs to be a special treat that they only get for putting up with me.”

“That makes sense,” Martinez agreed.

“Hopefully, within a week or two, Buttons and Baubles will think of me as ‘the food bringer’ instead of ‘the scary lady’.”

“So what do we do after that?”

“Once we get them used to me, we’ll use the cheese to get them used to the hypospray. Eventually, they’ll be begging us to use the hypospray because they know it comes with cheese.”

“But how long will that take?”

As the Ensign looked at you expectantly, you felt tension rising in your shoulders. This was the most difficult part of the conversation. Baubles was clearly so terrified that any interaction with him was dangerous. However, living on a space station put him at greater risk for disease. Baubles still needed his vaccinations on time, regardless of how he felt about it. That said, if you vaccinated him before he was ready, you would destroy all your counter-conditioning instantly. There was only one solution: he couldn't hold a grudge for what he couldn't remember.

You sighed heavily and shook your head. “That’s the tough part. We do need to vaccinate them soon, and the bribery will take a long time to work. If we force them to have a hypospray too soon, they’ll just be scared again." You looked up at Martinez and prepared for the coming storm. "If we can’t get them counter-conditioned to the hypospray by the vaccination date, then I’d like to sedate them so they won't know what happened.”

Martinez's jaw dropped. She clutched Buttons to her chest so hard the cat squeaked. "You want to drug my cats for a vaccine?!” 

Before you could open your mouth, you were cut off by a noise from your communicator.

“Odo to the Vet” the Comm-line crackled.

Seriously? Right now? 

“One second,” you apologized to Martinez. She glared at you. You tried to ignore it and replied to the communicator: "Go ahead Odo.”

“Doctor, I need you in the docking ring immediately.”

You raised an eyebrow and shifted to sit up straight. “What’s going on?”

“I need you to inspect a herd of Targs.”

You glanced over at Martinez. She had wrapped her arms protectively around Buttons. Sitting pin straight in her chair, her fierce muscle tension locked her jaw into a twitching frown. Of all the things that concerned you, the worst were her eyes.

You had seen the look in Martinez’s eyes only once before. During clinicals, you and T’kel had been in charge of a group of baby Sehlats post C-Section. They greatly resembled stuffed bear-cat animals with pointy white fangs. Their mother, however, was anything but a cuddly teddy bear. Whenever any student dared walk by her large stall, she threw herself, fangs first, at the bars, shrieking with bloodlust. You were forced to feed her using a rabies pole to push food into the cage from two meters away. Of course, because she was banging around in the enclosure, she ripped her surgical wound open again. You were the one who had darted her to sleep to simply use a dermal regenerator. As she went down, her glowing black eyes froze you to the floor. Lost in deep pools of inky darkness, you saw only your own death. Back then, there was no doubt in your mind that the mother Sehlat would hunt you to the ends of the galaxy if you harmed her kits. 

As you looked into her cold, brown eyes, you knew that Martinez felt the same way. Martinez, no doubt, felt you were threatening her cats with evil chemical restraint. No matter how ‘mean’ her cat acted, she would rather kill you than let her babies come to harm. If you didn’t explain yourself within the next minute, she would never let you touch him. You had to end the conversation with Odo. Now.

“I’m in the middle of something right now, Odo,” you explained. The words couldn’t come off your tongue fast enough. “I’ll be down as soon as I can.”

“Doctor, I need you down here now,” he demanded. You barely heard him, because you were too busy watching Martinez’s foot tap with impatience. 

“Is one of them hurt?” you questioned.

“No,” Odo stated.

“Did one get loose?” 

“No.”

Frowning frustratedly at no one in particular, you replied: “I’m confused, Odo. Explain to me why this can’t wait ten minutes?”

Odo’s snotty tone made it very clear that you were inconveniencing him. “I believe these Targs are being smuggled. I need you to inspect them before I can book their owner.”

Oh hell no! Smuggled animals were usually loaded to the brim with disease. You certainly were not going to run down to the docking ring, get exposed to who knows what, and bring it back to Buttons and Baubles. If Odo thought this inspection was so damn important, he could wait for you.

“Is the suspect going to leave in the next ten minutes?” you demanded.

“Not if I have anything to say about it,” Odo huffed.

“Then the Targs can wait. Vet out.” You cut the comm-line and turned back to your rapidly deteriorating client communication disaster. “I am so sorry, Ensign.”

Martinez was anything but satisfied with your apology. “Why on earth would you drug a cat just to give it vaccines?!” she demanded with a snarl.

You gestured to the glowing eyes under the sofa. “As it stands, I will need to sedate Baubles to get a look at him.”

“Dr. Bashir said we didn't have to sedate him because we have the gloves!” she shot back. “Can’t you just drag him out and hypospray him now?”

You shook your head. “That would just make him more fearful of me than he already is. As of now, he doesn’t have a bad experience with me. If he can recall me ‘attacking’ him then it will take MUCH longer to convince him to like me.”

Ensign Martinez looked unconvinced. You glanced at the gloves on the coffee table. The puncture marks in the heavy leather reminded you exactly why ‘better living through chemistry’ was a good policy.

“I certainly don’t think sedating animals/pets for vaccines is an acceptable standard practice. However, your cat has had **years** of bad experiences, and it will take time to fix that. The reason I’m willing to drop by here twice a day is because I believe Baubles shouldn’t live in fear of this. It isn’t good for him.”

“I know it’s not good for him…” she grumbled. You flinched at the icy atmosphere she gave off.

“The way Baubles is now, he’s a danger to himself,” you argued. “Right now he’s healthy and can handle the sedation. When he gets sick he might not be able to be sedated. The last thing I want is for Baubles to have a panic attack about being examined if he’s already sick.”

Martinez’s frown became just a bit softer as she looked at the sofa again. You could see she was finally starting to understand you. Time to go in for the kill.

“If we do the sedation and counter-conditioning now, while he’s young and healthy, we might be able to avoid a dangerous situation later. The goal of doing this now is so that we won’t have to do it again.”

“Okay," Martinez agreed reluctantly. "But only if he needs it."

“Why don’t we start with the counter-conditioning first," you recommended. "If you’re still not convinced, we can always do it how you suggested.” 

Ensign Martinez nodded.

“Odo to Vet," the disembodied voice from your comm-badge demanded. You ignored it.

"When are you off duty?” you asked.

“2200,” Martinez replied.

“With your permission, I’ll drop by then." You stood up and gathered your Medkit. Martinez also stood. Gently she set Buttons down on the chair. Fixing you with a wide eyed stare, Buttons stood frozen in her spot. You ignored her and made your way to the door. Martinez followed you. As you neared the exit, you added: "I won’t even need to come in. I’ll say hi and throw the cheese from the door. It will take less than thirty seconds.”

“Right. I’ll be here," the Ensign agreed. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Buttons sneaking away. If her body got any lower to the ground, she might have melted into the carpet. 

“Doctor, respond!" Odo commanded from the comm-line. You rolled your eyes at Martinez. She politely covered her smile and gave you a knowing nod. 

You tapped your badge with more force than was required. "I’m here Odo. I’m leaving now. I'll be there as soon as I get my boots."

“Heh,” Odo huffed and closed the comm-line.


	11. Bashir and the Frothing Rabid Veterinarian

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I bet you all thought we died.
> 
> That's okay. So did we.
> 
> Finals came upon us like a pack of Cardassian riding hounds. Thankfully they were friendly but we did need to go wash off the drool. I reverted to my favorite studying strategy (sobbing in the shower) and somehow miraculously passed all my exams. Geckomama said there was never any doubt we'd be okay, but I'm only now beginning to believe her. 
> 
> So far our fourth year clinicals have been tons of fun but the hours are definitely long. Plan on updates being slow and sporadic until at least next January. 
> 
> Also, I want to take a moment to say **Happy Mother's Day** to my mother. She's been hearing about this fanfiction for darn near six months and tolerating my babbling with the kind of affectionate amusement that only she can possess. Thanks mom. I love you.  
>  _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

By the time the door to Martienz’s quarters slipped closed, you were already “power walking” down the hall at a pace that would have made Odo scowl. Arms pumping with the swing of each leg, your face began to color with the exertion. With your new job came a substantial increase in walking. The exercise was, very slowly, allowing your pre vet-acad stamina to return. However, the crippling exhaustion of being on call 26 hours a day was doing its very best to reduce your athletic ability to that of a one week old kitten. You’d used up most of your energy this morning when you ran to Sickbay and it was all you could do to keep from panting like a Pug on a hot summer day. Not wanting to allow yourself to huff and puff openly, you tried to breathe through your nose but quickly gave up when the sound you produced mimicked an Andorian bull being assaulted by a Cardassian goose. You hopped into the lift and ordered it to the Promenade. The lift heaved to a start, jostling you into the railing. Mumbling death threats, you rubbed at the newly acquired bruise on your shoulder.

Seriously? The lift too? Anything other insentient objects to add to the shit list?

“Ops to Vet,” a cheerful voice interrupted.

Your hands were up in the air before you could stop yourself. “WHAT?!” you demanded

There was a sharp moment of silence on the other line that made you grimace guiltily. Talrak had been just as short with you on your first day of clinics and it darn near sent your high-strung self into a fit of tears. Hadn’t you promised that you wouldn’t behave like him? When did you forget that? You closed your eyes, sucked in the dry station air, and held the breath for a moment. It’s not the comm-officer’s fault; there was no reason to snap at him; you needed to apologize.

Chest tight with chagrin, you broke the silence, “That was rude of me. I’m sorry for snapping at you.”

“It happens to all of us,” came the fast and overly rehearsed reply. How often did the comm-officer get yelled at on this station? “I have a call for you whenever you’re ready.”

“Yes, I know,” you pinched the bridge of your nose just as the lift came to a halt. The moment the door slid open you continued toward Sickbay at a break neck pace. “Tell Odo I’ll be there in a minute.”

“It’s not Odo. The call is from Earth.”

The statement was just enough to break the rhythm of your brisk walk. Your right foot caught on the ankle of your left shoe, sending you pin wheeling towards the nearest structure. Since your imagination was totally incapable of picking the right moment, a picture of your calico avatar whirling her tail in a desperate attempt to regain her balance clouded your ability to control the fall. You tumbled together, the same look of aggravation and distress contorting your expressions.

**_WHUMP_ **

The noise of your encounter with the jumja stand wall reached you before the shooting pain up your collar bone. Your bruised shoulder ached as irritated tension clenched the muscles of your neck into hard rocks. Eye twitching, you sneered at the offending structure. “ _REALLY?!_ ” you shouted, slamming the kiosk with the ball of your foot. Just to make the case about how much of an asshole you weren’t, you gave the innocent sheet metal a frustrated shove. “REALLY?! WE’RE GONNA DO THIS **TODAY?!** ”

 _“_ Doctor…?” The tone of the comm-officer’s voice was quite and flavored with a soft with a twinge of fear. “Are you all right?”

Glancing up from your war with the wall, you began to notice the wide eyed expression of a nearby Bajoren couple. The woman whispered something into the man’s ear as he gave you a sideways glance. A warm embarrassment painted itself across your cheeks. The muscles of your throat clenched tighter, raising the pitch of your voice. “I’m fine,” you squeaked with shame.

“Should I patch the woman through?”

Oh… That’s right… Was it Tuesday already? You took a mental count of the days before deciding that it was indeed only Monday. Besides that, it wasn’t 2300 on Earth or DS9 and T’kel would never call at this time of the day.

“Listen, I’m on my way to an emergency right now…”

“I can just tell her that.”

You opened your mouth to agree, but a prickling on the back of your neck made you hesitate. “Who’s calling?” you asked cautiously.

“Someone named Alna, I think.”

**RED ALERT! SHIELDS UP!**

Every thought in your head scrambled for battle stations as air-raid sirens screeched in your ears. The color in your face drained away leaving the pallor of things that cannot be unseen. Burned into your memory like a brand on flesh, the condescending smile you knew would be on your sister’s face sent you into full on panic.

As far as you were concerned, Alna was the single most stubborn, self-centered creature to ever manipulate her way into existence. Trying to stand against her was rather like trying to circumnavigate Breen, barefoot, in a blizzard, wearing a brass bikini. A two time champion of the Alpha Quadrant Combat Arts Tournament and an adjunct self defense instructor at Starfleet Academy, Alna possessed tenacity that rivaled a Grishnar cat. You’d spent your entire childhood living like a gazelle in a lion’s den, trying to avoid all of her “let’s pretend” games which, most often, put you in the roll of something she could tackle to the ground and hog tie. While your mother insisted it was “probably just a phase”, Alna’s love of everything her body could do only escalated when she married a war-hardened Klingon officer. Your sister knew that the more she pressed, the more she got, and she was going to raze the universe until she got what she wanted.

Unfortunately, what she wanted was for you to come to her and Kroth’s for dinner before you left for DS9 and you’d forgotten. No doubt she’d saved up at least four months of epic, unending stories to regale you with. Much as you loved her, that would require several hours of time that you simply didn’t have. Worse yet, “not right now” was not a phrase in Alna’s vocabulary.

A cold sweat broke out on your brow. “Tell her…” you trailed off, racking your brain for a plausible excuse other than your own death. The scene in your mind was rather like people disembarking the Titanic; your imagination was running screaming in all directions looking for a place to abandon ship. “I’m not on the station right now. Tell her…” All the life boats were occupied. “that… I’m…” going down with the ship. Oh why didn’t you just go to that sunny resort instead of taking this stupid cruise? Wait… sunny resort!? “I’m at a medical conference!”

There was a pause on the line before the comm-officer explained: “She wants to know when you’ll be back.”

It took all your willpower you had to avoid screaming “NEVER”. “A week?” you lied. “Tell her not to call back until Friday.”

There was another ten seconds of silence before you had a response. “She said she tried to call you last week and you were busy then too.”

Had she called? Last week you turned off your comm-badge a few times while you were finishing the preparations for the breeding season. Maybe she’d tried to reach you then.

“Tell her you’re just the comm-officer and you don’t know anything about it,” you begged. “I really have to go.”

Your badge let out an exasperated sigh. “Okay doc. I’ll tell her. Ops out.”

The relief of Alna’s delay only remained for a few fleeting moments before the tense frustrations of the day returned. First, you couldn’t sleep; then Bashir royally dicked up your patient; then Odo crawled up your ass; and then Alna calls?! Teeth gritted, you backhanded a fist into the wall of the Promenade feeling not a single spark of pain as another loud CLANG echoed. Thank the heavens Odo was with the Targs because you weren’t entirely sure you could civilly listen to a lecture right now. A few people glanced in your direction, but quickly averted their gaze when they noted the poisonous mood that hovered around you.

What the hell did you do to deserve this?!

 

 

Bashir was still in his chair when you swept into Sickbay like a cold front. He was so engrossed in his work that he didn’t look up even though your temper must have chilled the room by three degrees. You glared at the article he was reading just because it existed. Prions? Fuck them. Talrak loved prions. Fuck him too. You fought down the ball of venomous words rising in your throat, opting instead to silently fume your way over to the storage closet. From the locker you snatched a pair of coveralls, disposable boots, a hair bonnet, two packs of earplugs and stuffed them all into a trash bag with such force that it nearly ripped.

The door banged shut much louder than you intended. As you turned to leave, you saw Bashir had spun his chair around. The ever-so-understanding smile on his face irritated you like a bad itch. If vet school taught you anything, it was how to recognize when you were in no condition to be a decent human being. Between your lack of sleep, and burning desire to tell Bashir exactly what you thought of his animal handling skills, you decided to retreat before you could say something spitefully satisfying.

"Did you have fun with Buttons and Baubles?" he asked.

"Oh, not as much fun as you did," you groused under your breath, heading towards the door.

Luckily for your schedule, it seemed that Dr. Bashir managed to miss your whispered comment entirely. He crossed his arms, beaming at you like the most vindicated man in the entire quadrant. You were beginning to suspect that for all his obvious intelligence (how had he done the genetic variance calculations that fast anyways?), he was rather bad at reading people. Sure, he could pick up that you were frustrated, but he clearly didn’t know a portion of that annoyance was directed at him.

"I take it that you think Baubles is a handful too,” Bashir attempted to commiserate.

The only handful you could think of was the handful of snide comments threatening to pour out of your mouth any second now. You stopped walking to take a breath, hoping it would restore what little self-control you had left. In your head, you could hear T’kel repeating the life lessons she’d taught you: “Yelling at Bashir will not accomplish anything. You must calm your emotions before you have this conversation. Leave for now. Take a moment to regain your composure. Then, when you are ready, you may return and provide positive critique. Recall Dr. D’tranb’s the lectures on communication. Do not make judgments; state only facts.”

"He needs help,” you replied diplomatically, shifting the bag from one hand to the other. Hopefully, Bashir was paying attention to body language today because your constant quick glances towards the door were a not-so subtle nonverbal hint that you had places to be that were not here.

Bashir let out a loud, scoff-like laugh. "HA! Help indeed."

Your eyes narrowed as you crossed your arms and gave the doctor a rather perturbed glare. Baubles may be crazy, but Bashir’s “tender care” had only justified the cat’s anxiety. Swallowing down that little comment, you repeated T’kel’s proverbs again… and again. Facts. Think facts. Fact one: When Bashir vaccinated Baubles, he was doing the best he could. Fact Two: Bashir was a humanoid doctor, not a veterinarian. Fact Three: If you had to treat a humanoid you’d be hopelessly clueless too. You were just beginning to feel a touch of sympathy for Bashir; but with all his ignorant bliss, the good doctor decided to continue his thought.

“I mean really... I don’t know what Ensign Walker sees in a cat like that,” Bashir added shaking his head.

Seriously, did this guy _want_ you to geld him?

Baubles clearly had a problem, but it was just the same as any other mental disorder. Baubles started with a losing ticket in the genetic lottery, and ended with a propensity to poorly cope with anxiety. There’s nothing wrong with being more fearful than average, as long as the issue gets addressed. Besides that, you not-so-secretly felt that Baubles’ complaints about Dr. Bashir’s bedside manner were somewhat justified; when you pictured being held down with chainmail gloves and forcefully injected, it made you terrified too.

“I’m worried about her living with such a dangerous animal,” Bashir explained, a concerned frown crossing his visage.

“I agree that the situation has become dangerous,” you replied, eyebrow twitching. Good sense begged you to keep your mouth shut. Imaginary T’kel firmly reminded you that Odo was still waiting for you. They were right. Rather than continuing this dead end conversation with Bashir, you needed to prioritize your duties. You would have too, had the good doctor not blundered on with the worst possible thing he could say.

He sighed and propped his elbows on his slim thighs. Resting his head in the palms of his hands, he looked up at you with a weak smile. “What are you going to do about him?”

What were you going to do about Baubles? After **Bashir** screwed you over?! After he single handedly set a bad precedent that nearly prevented your patient from receiving any medical help? And worst of all, **blaming** said patient for the current state of affairs! He had the **gall** to ask you what you were going to do? Well! You certainly knew what you were going to do first!

“I’m going to try to fix all the shit you did to him!” you snapped, dropping your bag to the floor.

If Bashir thought a five kilogram cat was dangerous, you couldn’t fathom what he thought about frothing rabid veterinarian. His mouth hung open slightly as he stared at you in confused silence. A frustrated heat burned across your face as your stomach clenched into a tight knot of indignation and self-righteous justification. You could feel your heartbeat radiating all the way up to your ears, drowning out all other sounds

Normally, you would have reserved this level of pissed off for someone who had actively harmed an animal. Then again, Bashir had harmed Baubles. Well... not so much physically harmed as “emotionally shattered”. All the same, it was by no means irreparable. And it’s not like the good doctor had set out to cause a problem. Perhaps you just held him to a higher standard because you knew he was indeed an intelligent doctor. You’d seen his interaction with humanoid patients; barring the chronic case of foot-in-mouth that seemed to appear whenever you spoke to him, he had a charming bedside manner. There wasn’t really cause to be this upset with Bashir, but in the end, the reasons didn’t really matter.

Sometimes, it just felt so goddamn good to be angry.

Bashir was having no trouble seeing where your anger was directed now. He sat up in his chair, looking like a dog who’d just been assaulted by the house calico for reasons unknown. Bewildered and shocked, his words came cautiously, as if he were trying to sneak away. "What I did to him?" he questioned slowly.

"If you had spent a little less time with his ‘easy’ anatomy and a little more time on animal behavior you might have realized he was extremely fearful!" you seethed.

"Fearful?!” Bashir exclaimed, his eyes wide. “He attacked me!”

"It’s called ‘fear aggression’,” you informed him forcefully, jabbing your index finger in his direction. “And I’d attack you too if you dragged me out of my hiding place and manhandled me!"

"Manhandled?! I never-"

" **The hell you didn't!** " you bellowed, slamming your hand against the door frame. After thoroughly asserting your dominance with the loud noise (you highly evolved primate you), your right hand swung wide as you pointed in the general direction of Martinez's quarters. "I just spent the better part of an hour trying to repair his relationship with his owner. It seems someone told her the cat was just 'being mean'!"

Bashir’s lower lip pouted just the tiniest little bit as he gawked at you."I didn't-"

"It doesn't matter what you didn't do!” you snarled, fixing your human counterpart with a scathing glare. “What you **did** do was convince her that it was perfectly okay to substitute leather gloves for behaviorally appropriate handling! She doesn't want me to sedate him because **you** told her it wasn't necessary. That cat needs as much help as a child with extreme iatrophobia and you just held him down and forced it on him!”

At this point, Bashir rose out of his chair. He closed the distance between you in two long steps. His brows were scrunched together and his full lips were set in a creased frown. His eyes just read hurt. “He didn’t seem fearful when he bit me!” he pointed out.

Undeterred by Bashir’s unintentionally assertive posture, damn him being tall, you got right up in his space and poked him dead center in the chest. “What do you think all that hissing was?” you fired back. “If you had done your research, you would know that Baubles is so terrified of medkits that he screamed in fear when I set it on the floor. Tell me Doctor, what were you going to do if he was sick? Just hold him down and hope he didn’t die from the stress?!"

Bashir turned his head just slightly to the side, eyes no longer meeting yours. His mouth moved but no words came. When he finally spoke, the usually talkative man’s voice was slow, halting, and unsure. “It’s not like I didn’t try to get a veterinarian sooner. I...”

Soft chocolate eyes met yours beseechingly. A feeling of regret punched you in the gut.

It was very clear that while nothing you said was inaccurate, everything you did was wrong. Bashir was blatantly repentant and you just kept hammering him like a bully stuffing a child into a locker. Why did you have to go and open your big mouth? You were a doctor now! You knew better than this! Goddamn it. Why were you always screwing things up?

“I-I’m sorry...” you whispered, in a tiny voice, backing out of the deflated doctor’s personal space. You blinked up at him, gulping down a wad of thick saliva as you forced yourself to meet his eyes. Your tongue peaked out, wetting your lips just before you let off a sharp, short sigh.

Bashir cautiously cocked his head at the sudden apology.

“I’m sorry,” you repeated. You felt a familiar burning itch in your nose, and fought to keep from letting your eyes get misty. You already looked enough like an emotional wreck without bursting into tears. “I had a very difficult conversation with Ensign Walker about Baubles. I really didn’t know what to expect, but seeing him like that just... broke my heart. It was wrong of me to take it out on you.”

Bashir’s patient look reappeared full force. The corners of his lips twitched upwards into a small, understanding smile. In a placating gesture, he placed a gentle hand on your shoulder. “The situation is hardly your fault. You’re right; I botched it up.”

You returned Julian's smile with a wan one of your own, and shook your head. “That doesn’t justify all the things I said to you. I feel like I’m always yelling at you. That’s no way to treat a friend.”

At the word ‘friend’, Julian’s face lit up like a palm becon. He gave your shoulder a gentle squeeze, beaming at you proudly. “Don’t worry; it’s all forgotten and forgiven.” Playfully, Julian lifted his hand and gave you a double pat on the back. “Besides, it’s not like I don’t understand some of what you’re going through. That’s why I keep trying to get you to sleep and eat. I tried to live without both when I first got here and it just made me cross.”

You laughed heartily at the doctor’s comment, finally starting to feel a bit calmer. “Speaking of cross, I still have to deal with Odo.”

“Ah, yes DS9’s own personification of regulations,” Julian agreed, giving you a mischievous smirk. You giggled politely into your hand when you saw the doctor’s ridiculously raised eyebrow and bright expression. “He’s a good chap. I’m sure you’ll warm up to him eventually.”

“I just hope I don’t make him more annoyed,” you replied, grabbing your bag from the floor.

“It wouldn’t hurt him to feel something human ,” Julian commented.

“Oh really?” you asked, a devious smile crossing your face. “Are you suggesting I purposely mess with him?”

Julian winked. “Could be just what the doctor prescribed.”

“Well then,” you called over your shoulder, as you walked out the door. “Who am I to argue with a professional?”

 

 

When you reached the docking ring, twenty minutes after Odo's first call, you found the constable guarding the door like a junkyard dog . His icy eyes glared at you accusingly as you approached. You swallowed down a bolus of nerves, and tried to focus on the job at hand

"Nice to see you could tear yourself away from the cats," he grumbled, crossing his arms.

"Thank you for your patience," you replied sarcastically.

With great gusto you set your medkit down, opened the disposable bag, and began to remove its contents one piece at a time. First, you shook the bonnet out and placed it over your hair, tucking a few stray strands under its flimsy elastic hem. Flinging the science officer teal coveralls out with a snap of your wrists, you unzipped the front and climbed into them with a ridiculous amount of one legged hopping to assist you. Next you kicked off your shoes and tossed them over by the wall. Why you hadn’t done that earlier to facilitate getting into the coveralls was a mystery even to you. Their loud thumping against metal elicited a great heaving sign from the constable. You then placed the tall rubber boots on the ground and stepped into them, being sure to tug the bottom of your pants inside the heel of the footwear. When you began to seal the coveralls, the zipper caught on the front of your uniform and became stuck fast. Cursing under your breath you tugged it down with a few short jerks before yanking it all the way to your collarbone with a loud ZIP. You thrust your arm to the bottom of the bag and grabbed the ear-plugs before holding a pair out to Odo.

He waved you off, pointing to his overly rounded ears. “I can close them on my own.”

“Oh right,” you murmured, standing up. “I forgot about the whole shape shifter thing.” With a grunt, you tore open the plastic packaging and rolled the rubber foam between your fingers until it formed a sort of squashed cone shape. With a few deft pushes, you tucked the ear plugs inside your external auditory meatuses and tossed the disposal bag next to your shoes.

“Do you always take so long to do everything?” Odo demanded, tapping his foot against the floor.

You smiled at the security chief with a heartless toothy grin. “No, this is special, just for you,” you answered, leisurely checking over your medkit. Odo looked like he might explode with impatience by the time you finally stood to face him.

"Let's just get this over with," he groused, waving you through the airlock. You unhurriedly followed him through the double doors, reveling in your inefficiency. Odo’s shoulders were so tight he could have torn his trapeziuses off the bone, if he had them.


	12. Stand Your Ground

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey all! Great news! Chapter 13 should be up some time in late June/July. Until chapter 15 we'll be playing with targs and torturing the main character. After all, why should only O'Brien have to suffer? 
> 
> To celebrate us reaching our clinical year, Geckomama has whipped up [ another lovely fanart ](http://i1304.photobucket.com/albums/s525/Alldoctorswornandweary/10314694_10102015499709312_2972574613689800491_n_zps8fe3ea77.jpg) with a different imagination of "Dr. Herriot". She's planning to draw "Herriot" in many different races and hair colors as the story goes on since "Herriot" is just a place holder for all of you. Today's Herriot is either black or East Indian. We'll leave that for your interpretation. :3 
> 
> For those of you who aren't familiar with large animal medicine, the long glove is a called a palpation sleeve. It's used for rectal examinations of large animals like horses and cattle. It's seriously fun stuff unless you're up to your shoulder in a cow and she spews diarrhea down the neck of your coveralls. That's not so fun.

The smell of the ship announced its cargo long before you reached the hold. The burning stench of urine and boar’s musk was almost bearable on the main decks, but by the time you reached the bowels of the ship the fetor of yesterday’s ordure slammed into you like a rampaging pus hog.

“What’s going on with your air purification system?” you wheezed, trying not to breathe through your nose.

The pudgy Yridian captain sneered at you through the heavy ruching on his face. “It broke,” he stated loudly enough to be heard through your ear plugs.

You rolled your eyes at Odo and shot him a pointed look. He caught your gaze and returned your frustration with perfect synchrony. He scowled at the bat eared man, but the captain ignored both of you to open the cargo bay doors. Just beyond the holding shield, you could see a large group of sleeping targs. They startled to their feet at the sound of archway opening and stared at your party with little, black, watery eyes. A few of the braver ones approached the shield, standing about five meters from the door.

Odo leaned against the wall just outside the cargo bay and crossed his arms. “What’s your verdict, Doctor?”

You moved a step closer to the humming force field, trying to look past the buzzing pink swirls. It wasn’t hard to notice the short, broad snout and worn chin sabers protruding from their jaw. Domestic targs had been bred for a longer, thinner muzzle specifically to increase the length of their valuable, gourmet tongues. Wild specimens with this same build found their noses too delicate to root through hard packed soil. In unmanaged domestic targs, chin sabers often grew long because they weren’t used for battle on a regular basis; most herdsmen either removed these rostral spines or at least sanded them down. The chips on the end of these tusks were much more indicative of targs who knew how to use them for their intended purpose.

“They’re either wild, or only a few generations removed from it,” you confirmed. “I’d have to scan one to be sure.”

Odo turned his sharpest gaze to the captain, who was rapidly turning from grey to purple. “It’s not a crime to have some of the less domesticated varieties,” the Yridian insisted.

“Separate one off from the herd and we’ll see how ‘less domesticated’ they are,” Odo commanded, pointing at the consul. The captain nodded vigorously and began typing in the command codes.

In a few brief moments one of the smaller targs found itself`quite alone. It went from a quiet alertness to full on panic in mere seconds. The hairs on its back bristled straight up like a wave of quills as it raced back and forth along the force field, desperately trying to get back to the herd. The other targs ran to the opposite wall, watching their companion’s alarm with wary interest. The terrified targ threw himself into the force field, tusks first, bouncing off it with a sizzling sound. You grimaced at the sickening display of self induced trauma. Eyes ablaze you began to count the number of animals in the hold. When your total came to thirty eight, your heart pounded violently and your face went scarlet.

“I need your pig board and a snare. NOW,” you demanded thrusting a hand expectantly at the captain. Skin thoroughly flushed, he dashed off around the corner calling for a crewmate. You looked from the frightened animal to Odo; your jaw clenched tight. Voice low and shaking, you growled: “If these things are domestic I’ll eat my boots. Domestic targs grow up with force fields. They’d never be foolish enough to ram one like that once, let alone repeatedly. Only wild targs would panic at the sight of a shield.” Hands locked into a balled fist, your knuckles ran white as your fingernails dug into your palms. Your whole body quivered as a wave of rage coursed through you. Immediately, you tore open your medkit and reached for your hypospray while continuing to explain your anger. “What pisses me off the most is the number of targs.”

“What about it?” Odo asked, raising a brow at you. Fingers fumbling, you loaded 1.5cc of a combo Moletamine and Xylazepam solution into the hypospray.

You snorted. “To make maximum profit, you would haul the maximum number of animals you could. However, targs are only capable of remembering fifty animals at a time. If you put any more in one enclosure, they’ll fight until they kill each other. There are only thirty eight targs in there.” As the animal shrieked out in pain, thrusting repeatedly into the shield, you tried to remember to breath. Finally, you turned to look Odo straight in his blue eyes, a burning saltiness building in your own. “Wild targs don’t respond well to confinement. In fact, many will charge shields until they kill themselves. How much you want to bet that this,” you pointed to the now bleeding targ, “is exactly what happened to the other twelve?”

“I’ve got them!” the captain called down the corridor. He and another crewman rushed forward carrying a thick board of red polymer and a long metal pole with a loop on the end. The captain handed both tools to the crewman before typing in the access code to the room. Odo stood in the hall near the panel while you, the captain, and the crewman all entered the cargo bay. With your boots squelching in the manure saturated straw, you brought a sleeve to your mouth and coughed violently as aerosolized ammonia seared its way down your trachea.

The now ataxic, bloody targ was sizing up the shield for another run when he noticed the three of you moving forward. His pain forgotten instantly, he fled to the back corner of the room; eyes bulging out of his head, he lifted his short little tail and sprayed liquid feces behind him. Slowly, the three of you advanced on him. You allowed the captain and the crewman to walk a few steps ahead of you. The Captain took the hog snare from his crewman and motioned for him to come along the backside of the boar. The targ blinked at them, ears perked and nostrils flaring as you crept closer and closer. Deliberate and cautious, the crewman pressed forward with the pig board, pinning the targ against the wall. 

With incredible speed, the captain reached over the top of the red polypropylene paneling, slipped the wire loop behind the boar's canines and pulled it tight against the beast’s nose. Even with earplugs in, its high pitched shrieking ripped straight into your brain, nearly shattering your eardrums. Wincing, you stumbled forward just as the man at the board pulled away. As the targ tried to back away the captain leaned in the opposite direction, creating a deadlock between himself and the boar. Quickly, you squatted in the manure covered straw by the animal’s fatty neck. Head trapped by his own reckless resistance, the targ was unable to dodge the hypospray you injected into his jugular furrow. You shuffled backwards and onto your feet as the captain released the targ from the snare. All three of you backed away from the animal, watching as he bucked and kicked his way around the pen. 

When you reached the force field, Odo deactivated it to allow you back into the hall. He wrinkled his nose at the slimy blend of bedding and feces stuck to your boots. “Why didn’t you scan it while you had it snared?” Odo demanded.

You ignored him, completely focused on the targ. “It needed to be sedated or it’d just ram the shield again.” As you spoke the targ was already beginning to settle down. Its furious bucking had subsided to more of an angry pacing. “Besides, I’m not stupid enough to put a medical tricorder close to a wild animal. What we did was dangerous enough and we had a snare holding him still.”

“But he didn’t attack!” the captain insisted happily, wiping the sweat from his brow as he joined you in the corridor. “I told you he was tame!”

“I think we both know a wild animal, especially a young one, will run before attacking,” you chided, fixing the captain with your finest impression of professor Talrak’s ‘serious face’. Beneath the disdainfully bland visage lay a molten core of razing ridicule about to erupt to the surface. The captain’s excitement withered like a flower in a stream of lava, immolated and crumbling to ash. Quietly, he twiddled his thumbs and refused to meet your gaze. Satisfied with his silence, you harrumphed at him and finally faced Odo. “I got the hypospray directly over his jugular, so it should only be about ten minutes before the drug takes effect.”

“Only ten?” Odo echoed disgruntled. “When Dr. Bashir sedates someone, the drug takes effect immediately.”

A snide comment about Dr. Bashir not being a veterinarian nearly slipped out of your mouth before you restrained yourself.

“All members of the suidae family are resistant to sedatives, but targs are notorious,” you explained, watching the targ’s back end swaying slightly as it tried to remain standing. “Giving them a hypospray on the jugular is the equivalent of giving a terran hog the same dose intramuscular. It’s worthless to dose them any other way but IV; they’d never go down. Believe me, if it was possible any other way, I would have just darted that boar.” 

The boar’s snout dipped just slightly, scraping across the muck in the cargo bay. As the sedative spread, the targ went sway backed, his stomach sinking closer to the ground. Finally, his right rear leg kicked out to one side, sending his hindquarters flopping to the floor. Despite the animal’s best attempts to stand, his shaky limbs simply couldn’t support the 70kg of weight. Finally, with one great sway, his front feet splayed out and he lay down to sleep. 

With the patient unconscious, you opened your medkit, removed a pair of disposable gloves, hypospray, and tricorder. When the captain deactivated the force field again, you slipped into the room and made a beeline for the animal. Gingerly, you tapped him with your foot. Sure enough the animal stayed still. You activated your tricorder and began timing his respiration rate. For the moment, his breathing was not depressed enough to require ventilation. Warily watching for changes, you began to scan the pig for any signs of disease. His temperature was elevated (41°C) which brought you pause. After working your way from snout to tail, you noted an abnormally large scrotum.

Pulling on your gloves, you hung the tricorder around your neck and began the full physical examination. It took every bit of self control not to start the exam with the abnormal scrotum, but your professors had drilled the importance of a systematic physical into your head for four years straight. The physician who failed to do their exam in a consistent order was often the fool who managed to miss something. Acknowledging wisdom of your predecessors, you elected to follow the same pattern as always. Evaluation of his mouth, neck, musculoskeletal system, and abdomen all yielded normal results; as you palpated every lymph node along his body you weren’t surprised to find his inguinal lymph nodes were swollen.

Finally, it came time for the reproductive exam. Taking the scrotum in your palms you attempted to move the swollen testicles inside their casing. Rather than being freely mobile and soft, they were firm and hot to the touch. As you exteriorized his penis, the boar began to stir from his slumber. Seriously? He was already getting up? Resistant nothing; targs must eat sedatives for breakfast! You gently groped the corkscrew organ in your hands, feeling for any lumps, bumps, or sores along its length. Satisfied there were none, you carefully removed your gloves and grabbed your hypospray from the front pocket of your coveralls. The boar lifted his head and stared at you sleepily as you obtained the blood sample from his left jugular. He began to paddle his feet, so you backed away and walked to the door.

“Orchitis and a fever,” you told Odo as you entered the hall. You held the blood sample aloft for him to examine. “It’ll take me about a minute to have the tricorder analyze this, but I have a bad feeling you’re right about these targs.” 

Sample in hand, you dropped a few spots of blood onto a slide and clicked the swatch into place. With the push of a few buttons you set the mini-computer to the task of checking for pathogens. The tricorder whirled to life, giving off a light hum as it scanned the crimson fluid.

Odo rounded on the captain with a face hard as stone. “Less domestic variety are they?”

The Yridian threw up his hands defensively, shaking his head violently from side to side. “I-I swear I had no idea!”

“And I suppose you had no idea why these creatures weren’t on the cargo manifest either?” Odo demanded, looming over the captain like a Klingon Monster Dog over a baby targlette. The captain blanched the color of eggplant, paralyzed by the Constable’s glare. Odo continued his observations; eyes alight with the delight of impending justice. “Smuggling of animals will get you five years in a Bajoran prison cell. If they’re a danger to public health, the sentence triples. If these are wild targs… well then… I hear the Klingon’s are qui-”

“Odo,” you stated, cutting him off. The constable looked away from his quarry, almost stunned by your interruption. You held the tricorder aloft, the result glowing on the screen. “I thought you might want to know that, amongst other things, they have Targ Undulant Fever. It’s a highly pathogenic type of Brucella bacteria.”

“Do domestic stocks have it?” Odo inquired.

You shook your head. “There’s a mandatory report and eradication program for that on Kronos. If this stock left by any legal channel they would have been slaughtered at port and the carcasses burned.”

“Oh really?” If Odo’s smug grin got any larger it would probably achieve sentience. “Isn’t that _interesting_?”

The captain seized the arm of your coveralls, grasping for any chance at escape. “I swear I had no idea!” he pleaded, tears leaking from his pudgy eyes.

“Ignorance is no excuse,” Odo fired back, grabbing the captain by the shoulder. He forcefully removed the man from your arm, cheerfully hauling him down the corridor by the sleeve. You grabbed your medkit and followed after them, leaving flattened clumps of manure behind you.

“Odo! He needs to go through decon before you put him in the prison cell!” you called after the tall blond.

“I’m well aware of that, Doctor!” Odo replied. He came to an abrupt halt by the turbolift and tapped his commbadge. “Odo to Engineering, beam this man directly into holding cell A and make sure he runs through the biofilter. Energize.”

The transporter beam engulfed the terrified smuggler in blue light before you had a chance to argue. As soon as his captive was gone, Odo stepped onto the lift and you scurried after him. He punched in the command for the ship’s main deck and the turbolift jolted upwards with a loud shaky **CLANG**. You swayed at the sudden motion, grabbing Odo’s shoulder for support. As soon as you caught your balance, you dropped your hand. If your sudden closeness had any effect on the changeling, he didn’t indicate it. There was no blushing, no protesting, not even so much as a glance of acknowledgement. 

“And the animals need to be quarantined,” you added tentatively. In your head, you cursed your lack of balance and begrudgingly admitted to yourself that Odo just exuded an atmosphere of cool and collected. It was like standing next to Sherlock Holmes. You wondered if the fictional Watson ever felt the same jealously you felt now. If only you could bottle that unflappable aura, maybe you wouldn’t look like such an idiot whenever you were in front of Sisko.

“Agreed. We’ll have Chief O’Brien beam them to an empty cargo bay as evidence,” Odo remarked placidly.

You whipped your head around, staring at Odo as if he’d turned into an Adabran mud leech. “You want to _WHAT_?!”

Odo turned to raise a hairless brow at you. “Well, we can’t very well leave them on the ship. The crew would just try to escape with them.”

“You’re sure as hell not bringing those pigs onto the station!” you exclaimed. “They’re **loaded** with at least three zoonotic diseases aside from the Brucellosis, none of which the biofilter can remove completely!”

The turbolift slammed to a halt, jolting you into the doors. You managed to grab the support bar to prevent you from falling over completely. Odo, who must have been paying more attention than you, barely even shifted in his spot. He tucked his arms behind his back, looking distinguishingly poised. With all the self-possession of a great detective, Odo simply said: “We don’t have time to argue.”

Your eye twitched at the security chief. You crossed your arms, fingers drumming on your elbow as the doors opened behind you. Odo looked down at you incredulously before sidestepping around you. Determined not to let him just walk away without a fight, you jogged after him. Your knuckles were pale from gripping your medkit so hard.

By the time you reached the airlock, you finally caught up to the security chief. You tapped him hard on the right shoulder. He turned to face you, meeting your disapproval with his own annoyance.

“Doctor-” Odo warned.

“You’re going to have to make time,” you stated firmly.

Odo crossed his arms. “I have more important things to worry about right now, like trying to maintain station security.”

“And I’m trying to maintain station biosecurity,” you replied sourly. "I’m not going to let you beam those targs anywhere while they’re still ill! Brucellosis is zoonotic!”

“Which doesn’t matter if they’re in a containment field," Odo pointed out. "They won't have any contact with humanoids, so the targs can't spread it."

You shook your head at Odo in disbelief. "You just saw how wild targs respond to small spaces!”

“We’ll make it a big containment field.”

“And it’ll be even bigger yet when the voles chew right through its power supply!” you argued, throwing your hands down at your sides. Odo was just about to reply when a mechanical crackle cut him off.

“Engineering to Odo," his commbadge chirped. You glowered at him, eyes just daring him to answer it.

Odo tapped the device and ignored you completely: “Odo here, go ahead.”

“Sir, we were able to get the gross contamination off him, but the computer says his bacterial load is too high to correct.”

A sour smile spread across your face as you gave Odo your finest 'I told you so' look. For his part Odo seemed neither surprised nor disconcerted. Seizing the opportunity to make your point, you tapped your own commbadge.

"Vet to Doc Bashir," you requested smugly.

“Bashir here. What’s going on?” the commbadge replied in a British accent.

“There’s a man in security with a bad case of subclinical, high-path Brucellosis,” you explained.

“Brucellosis? How the hell did he catch that?”

“He caught it from our new wild targs,” you replied sweetly. 

There was a momentary pause as you let the words sink in. A sly smile crossing your face as you bent down to grab the “two-in-one sonic scrubber and sterilizer” out of your medkit. Just as you flipped the on switch, Julian’s confused voice returned to the commline.

“What wild targs? Who in their right mind would bring wild targs onto the station?!” Julian demanded. Vindictively, you hoped Odo could hear the bewilderment a normal person had at such an idea.

“Believe me…” you purred self righteously, cleaning your boots, “it’s a _long story_.”

A particularly loud sigh came over the line. “I’ll go over there and see to him right away.”

“You’re a peach, Julian,” you said kindly, making sure to use his name for added effect. As you closed the commline, you made a mental note to thank him again later. Bashir was truly a good person to forgive you so fast. You made one final pass over the teeth of your footgear before turning off the sterilizer. Device in hand, you stood up and turned to face Odo. “See? We can’t just go moving those cesspools around the station!”

“Why don’t we let Commander Sisko decide what to do,” Odo suggested grumpily.

“Fine!” you agreed, grabbing your medkit. “Let’s see what he thinks!”

With great exasperation, Odo shook his head and tapped the commbadge. “Odo to Commander Sisko.”

In the pause following Odo’s hail, you snapped the sterilizer back into the med kit and grabbed the disinfector for your hands

“Go ahead, Odo,” the deep baritone of Commander Sisko acknowledged. 

You hummed lightly as the warm beam of the disinfector rolled gently up your arm. Odo cast a sideways glance at you, raising an eyebrow at your antics. You smiled placatingly at him, gesturing for him to hold out his hands too. He rolled his eyes at you before begrudgedly allowing you to sanitize him. 

“Commander...” Odo paused for a moment when you waved your hands in front of his face. Once you had his attention, you pointed to his shoes and made a gesture encouraging him to lift up his foot. Odo shot you the most exasperated glare as he balanced on one leg, allowing you to disinfect his boot…feet…whatever you’d call that part of a changeling. “...the vet and I have a situation down on the docking ring that requires a decision rather urgently. When could we come talk to you about it?”

“I’m free right now, Constable. Meet me in my office.”

You shot Odo a look, and pointed to the other shoe. Shaking his head with an exasperated snarl, he switched feet. You went right back to your work, glad that Odo had chosen to stay out of the targ pen. If he’d gone in, the amount of crap on his feet would have required the scrubber setting.

“We’ll be there as soon as possible,” the security chief replied, gesturing for you to hurry up. You raised your eyebrows at him, and shook your head. Killing Brucella bacteria wasn’t particularly hard, but a proper disinfection required a prescribed contact time. Odo would just have to wait.

“I’ll see you when you get here. Sisko out.” With that, the commline clicked closed.

“All done!” you replied, wiping the imaginary sweat off your brow. You replaced the tool in your kit and stood to face the agitated constable. “Sorry ‘bout that, but disinfection takes the time it will take.”

“Let’s just go,” Odo stated firmly, walking through the double doors to the docking ring.

“Wait up, Odo!” you protested, bending down just inside the hall. “I have to grab my shoes!”

For his part, the security chief managed to keep a professional demeanor intact as he waited for you to gather up all your supplies. You kicked the boots off your feet, throwing them into the plastic bag. It was a pain to pry the plugs out of your ear canals, so you took a moment to enjoy the sensation of cool, crisp air flowing freely into them. You carefully unzipped the coveralls so as not to touch the outside and tossed them in with the boots. With a happy sigh, you popped the plugs into the bag, tied the end in a knot and grabbed your shoes.

The second both shoes were on your feet, Odo took off towards the turbolift. You smiled triumphantly, and chased after him.


	13. Being Correct is Not Always Being Right

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... Remember when I said I'd post a chapter three months ago? Yeah... so clinics are busier than I thought. Funny thing how 10-12 hour days plus 2 hours of studying and 1-2 hours to shower/cook/clean/eat suddenly turns into not sleeping. I'm becoming really good at not sleeping. 
> 
> On the plus side clinics are still fun. I'm learning a ton about myself, human communication, and about veterinary medicine. The more I learn and the more stories I collect the more you'll see what the veterinary world is like for real.
> 
> There is one story that really sticks in my mind for the 5 months I've been in clinics so far. One late weekday night two very wonderful clients lost a very special fuzzy family member. It was possibly the most disappointing moment I've experienced because there was just nothing more that could be done. There's only one hard and fast rule about death in veterinary medicine and that is "you can cry, but never more than the clients". That night, I was barely keeping myself from crying just as hard as them. We all hugged, split a box of tissues and talked about how lucky the world was to have a creature as wonderful as theirs. At the very end of the conversation, the woman smiled at me, gave me a gentle squeeze around the shoulders and told me: "You'll be the sappy vet. And I mean that in a very good way."
> 
> Ladies and gentlemen, I hope I always stay the sappy vet. I don't ever want that to change.
> 
> Damn it... Now the feels have started again. Time to hug my cat and get on with the chapter.

After a quick stop at Sickbay to drop off the bag of boots and clothing for sterilization, you and Odo made your way through the Promenade to Ops. By the time you reached the turbolift, you were beginning to believe that Odo was not only making his legs longer as he walked, but purposefully trying to lose you. Never in your life had you seen someone take such large, purposeful strides. You secretly wondered if even the sight of Major Kira winking in silk negligee would have slowed the security chief. No matter how you tried to keep up, you found yourself lagging behind. Sharp stabbing pain shot up your shins as you half-walked, half-jogged to keep pace with the browless man’s relentless march. 

Still, all the cramping in your calves couldn’t compare to the burning in your chest at the thought of debating your case in front of the Commander. You silently cursed yourself for not only going along with this idea, but sounding so damn eager about it. The whole thing was the worst idea you’d had yet. Odo clearly possessed much more experience dealing with these matters and yet you just _had_ to play devil’s advocate. After all, if you were really confident in your vole protocol this shouldn’t be a problem, right? The voles only be in certain areas of the station anyways thanks to the bait lines. As long as you picked the right cargo bay, one far away from the old mining facilities, your concerns about the targs were pointless. Besides, Odo was obviously going to post security to prevent someone from “tampering with the evidence”. Security could handle any voles that snuck in. Really, at this point, doubting Odo is kind of doubting yourself.

Your thoughts continued their death spiral so that by the time you stood in Sisko’s office, you were an anxious train wreck.

 

 

“All right…” Sisko started, his eyes scanning Odo’s face and yours. “Does someone want to tell me what’s going on?” 

The commander propped his elbows on the large glassy desk. He folded his hands, resting his strong chin on top. As he raised an eyebrow, you shifted uncomfortably. Frustration had long since given way to apprehension and you found your resolve slipping in favor of stomach clenching nervousness. It wasn’t until you felt a dull ache in your hand that you realized just how tight you were gripping the handle of your medkit.

“Sir,” Odo took a confident step forward. You leaned back, shrinking slightly as you timidly held your own hand. “We’ve just found smuggled targs on import inspection. Based on the doctor’s examination, we have strong evidence to believe these are also illegally poached wild animals. I’ve already placed the captain in a holding cell. I also recommend we notify the Klingons. They have very strict laws about transporting wild targs off planet. In the meantime, I’d like permission to bring the animals aboard the station to hold as evidence.”

“All right, I will contact Starfleet command and let them know what’s going on.” Captain Sisko closed his eyes and rubbed his temples slowly. “I’m sure that the moment we tell the Klingons, we’ll be receiving an extradition request. In the mean time, how many animals are we talking?”

Odo let out a small cough. “Thirty eight.”

Sisko whistled in a low descending tone. “Thirty eight? That’s a lot of targ, Odo.” Turning his chair, Sisko’s eyes met yours. “Doctor, I’m assuming you took medical scans. What are we dealing with here?”

All the dread and agitation had completely replaced any knowledge or memories you possessed. It wasn’t until you realized that Sisko was looking straight at you that you remembered you were the ‘doctor’ he was addressing. Oh shit. What were you doing for the past hour? Why wasn’t it coming to you? Had you taken the scans? _Had you really?_ Your mouth felt tacky and dry. Unsure, you glanced down at your medkit trying to remember exactly what you used it for today. It was then that you realized the tricorder around your neck still needed to be cleaned. Idiot! How could you forget to get that sterilized? That’s a fomite!

“Y-Yes! Yes, I did,” you stammered, tripping over your own words. Internally you were screaming at yourself. Goddamn it! **Get your shit together!** You sound like a first year being quizzed by Talrak! With a large gulp you attempted to lubricate your parched tongue; it was of very little help. “Among other diseases, at least one of the animals has high-path Brucellosis."

Sisko blinked at you. “For those of us who don’t have a medical degree?”

You scratched your head awkwardly. “Brucellosis is a bacteria that humanoids can catch from infected animals. It may cause chronic debilitating illness and sterility. This particular type is very contagious. Even after a course of antibiotics, shedding is intermittent and lifelong. Therefore, slaughter is still the recommend response.” The unfortunate implications of your words came home when both men stared at you in horror. You threw your hands and flailed defensively. “For Targs! Not the Yridian…We can just fine him.”

Sisko pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed. “If it’s infectious, we need to put security protocols into place before we can bring them onto the station. That’s a lot of manpower.” The Commander spun his chair slightly to the side to look out the window. 

Out from his direct scrutiny, you took several deep but silent breaths, trying to will yourself back to calm. It was then that curiosity seized you. Unable to help yourself, you looked over at Odo to see how he was handling the stress. Your observations only enhanced your self-loathing. Odo, clearly nowhere near your level of neuroticism, actually seemed perfectly placid standing at attention. His jaw was relaxed, his shoulders squared with due poise. You both admired and despised him.

Sisko turned back to face you with a thoughtful look on his face. “If we have the medical scans,” he continued, shaking his finger to the rhythm of his thoughts, “why don’t we just use those as evidence? That way we don’t have to bring them onto the station. We can euthanize them on the ship and dispose of the bodies away from civilians.”

Now that was a good question. Most races would have gladly accepted the medical scans and allowed you to destroy the animals on their behalf. It was a perfectly logical thought. You felt very impressed by how quickly the Commander divined a sound solution. Tentatively, you looked him in the eye for the first time since you arrived in his office. His face was a mix of interest, trust and confidence. It was only then you saw the Commander for who he was.

Sisko was, in fact, not Talrak. He didn’t want you to read his mind and pick the ‘most correct’ answer to a hypothetical problem. Your commander was looking to two of his staff members to work out a solution to a real concern. He was certain that the advice you and Odo provided was accurate and practical. Sisko was ready to take your suggestions as the answer, right, wrong or anywhere in between. Sure, you could screw this up and let him down, but he was willing to believe you wouldn’t. For that alone, you held Commander Sisko in high esteem. You could do this. You would do this. The Commander deserved that much.

All right honey, so what do you know about Klingons?

Tooth by tooth a wide grin crept its way across your face. You could still hear Alna’s frustrated grousing about her pre-wedding duties like she was right beside you. Thanks to your sister’s unrivaled ability to complain while making Var’Hama candles, you had a very intimate knowledge of Klingon customs.

“There is a mandatory report and eradication program for Targ Brucellosis on Kronos,” you explained, rolling your shoulders back. Standing a little taller, you felt bright and emboldened. “However, wild targs are a culturally significant species; in order to kill a wild targ, there is short rite that Klingons perform to honor the warrior spirit of the animal. The Klingons will want the animals alive when they get here.” 

Both men stared at you blankly. You swallowed sheepishly. “My brother-in-law is a Klingon.”

“Ah,” Sisko acknowledged.

“There is also the matter of preserving evidence,” Odo added, his brows furrowing deeply at the thought. “The captain of that ship has a record of evidence against him… disappearing.” Odo frowned. “Live animals don’t disappear as easily as medical records.”

Sisko put his hands up in surrender. “Okay. Okay. So we have to keep them. Where do we store them?”

“There is an unused Cargo bay near Lower Pylon Three. It would need to be cleared out, but we could place a containment field on the door and post security in the hall.”

Your eyes nearly popped out of your head. Lower Plyon Three? The docking plyons were where the old ore processing facilities were located. Oh hell no! A new found determination coursed through you, filling your mouth with the confident words you’d been unable to articulate.

“This is the part where we disagree, Commander,” you explained, taking an emboldened step forward. “That area is in one of the most heavily infested parts of the station. If we activate the shield there it could draw the voles away from the bait line.”

Sisko raised an eyebrow at you. “So what do you suggest?”

“I think we should lock down the smuggler’s ship and store them there.”

Odo huffed and crossed his arms. "Commander, I don’t recommend that. From a security point of view, it’s much easier for someone to take the targs if we leave them on the ship. Compared to risking those animals being transported somewhere else, bringing them onto the station is an acceptable risk.”

“Acceptable risk?’ You fixed Odo with a critical stare. “The paperwork for the biosecurity protocols alone will take me a day to complete!” Your voice cracked into a dismayed whine. “If the voles eat through the containment fields and wild targs get loose, it could be a week or more!”

Odo cocked his chin up a little higher and looked down his nose at you. The annoyed look on his face made you feel like a Chihuahua barking at a Bulldog.

“Forgive me, Doctor, but isn’t dealing with the paperwork your job?”

Oh, he was going to go there was he?

In between meeting with patients you were trying to manage a controlled scientific experiment, writing health certificates and coordinating with O’Brien to drop bait lines. You were even checking the birth control concentrations of any voles that were killed and marking their locations on a map of DS9. For crying out loud, Odo's own security officers were responsible for many of the deliveries. Just yesterday, Morn told you that he’d overheard the security officers likening finding you to a manhunt; you were the single most difficult person to talk to on the station because you were literally running from one thing to the next. So it took you longer to complete a task than Bashir. Big freaking whoop! What you lacked in punctuality you always made up for with hard work. Sure, you were barely eating and only sleeping by the grace of a hypospray, but damn it you always got your work done. It was the one thing you could pat yourself on the back for, and Odo could go to sunbathing on Breen if he was going to imply that you didn’t work hard enough. Two could play that game!

You glared at Odo. “Isn’t preventing things like this from happening yours?”

“Gentlemen-” Sisko started, trying to stop the argument before it went anywhere. You both turned back to the Commander. “Is there some other issue that needs to be brought to my attention?”

“No, Sir,” you replied quickly in a sharp, formal tone. From the corner of your eye, you saw Odo glance at you. His gaze was so penetrating, you wondered if he was trying to read your mind. You stared resolutely forward and refused to meet his eyes. After a few quiet seconds, the Security Chief turned his attention to the Commander. 

“No,” Odo confirmed.

Sisko cocked his head slightly and raised an eyebrow skeptically at you both. “Then let’s get back to the issue at hand. Odo, the Doctor brings up a good point about the voles. How can we be sure that we won’t have a repeat of the last time they destroyed the fields?”

“I can’t be, Sir,” Odo responded honestly. “I will have my men posted in the area. I can post an extra detail to specifically hunt for voles. However, as the Doctor suggested, my job is not only crime prosecution but crime prevention. I feel that the health of our station is best protected by allowing this single action to stop this man from further smuggling in the future.”

“Fair enough,” Sisko stated, turning his attention to you. “Doctor? What is your response?”

“Frankly, I’m concerned. This very situation goes to prove we can’t one hundred percent prevent this from happening in the future. Brucellosis can be long lived in the environment and if contamination spread to an area such as the Promenade, we could be looking at a station wide quarantine. Rather than taking this risk for an unknown benefit, I recommend playing it safe. One man is not worth putting everyone in the station at risk.”

“It’s not about just one man,” Odo argued. “This is about setting an example.”

“I want to see this guy punished for what he did too, Odo,” you replied. “But this is not the time! We have to get rid of these voles first and then we can do things like this.”

Odo’s eyes were hard as he stared you down with intense scrutiny. “And how long will that take? Days? Months?”

You fidgeted. “A year or two…” 

“And we don't know if it will work,” Odo pointed out.

You stomach clenched as if Odo had physically punched you in the gut. Gritting your teeth, your hands curled into defensive fists. “It’ll work as long as we keep people on this station from smuggling in new voles.”

“I'm trying to do just that,” Odo argued, crossing his arms, "You were the one who refused to come inspect the animals.”

You met Odo’s accusations with a sneer. “I was meeting with a client!” you protested fiercely. “I told you I would be there as soon as I could and-”

"And you were late."

The hairs on the back of your neck bristled slowly, sending a tickling shiver down your arms. "I couldn't just drop her without finishing the discussion. You demanded my presence and expected me to come right away when it wasn't even an emergency!"

"Playing with Martinez cats is hardly as important as gathering evidence against known smugglers,” he scoffed.

A quiver of rage slithered up your body, settling in knot in your stiffened shoulders. Your nostrils flared as your fingernails dug tightly into your palms. Before your brain could stop you, words filled with all the hurt and frustration you'd felt since Odo first paged you stampeded out of your mouth like a rampaging Fury. “What does it matter?!” you snarled. “I’m not sure you could do your job even with evidence!”

“GENTLEMEN! THAT IS **ENOUGH**!” Sisko roared, slamming his hands down on the desk. 

The room was completely still in the wake of Sisko’s booming display. He rose from his chair slowly; his voice was low and deep like thunder rolling across the sky. “Now I don’t know what is going on here but I'm not going to have two of my officers bickering like children.” Sisko’s head snapped towards the security chief so fast you swore it would crack. “Odo, from now on, you _will_ respect the Doctor’s time. If she says she’s with a patient, then it will have to wait. Am I making myself clear?”

Odo’s face was as emotive as a Vulcan. “Yes, Sir."

Sisko nodded firmly. "Get chief O’Brien and start clearing that cargo bay. If that shield goes down I’m holding you,” the commander jabbed his finger at the constable, “ _personally_ responsible. I suggest you assign your staff accordingly.” 

Odo remained motionless as he stiffly took in the Commander's criticism. “I understand, Sir.”

“Good,” Sisko barked, cocking his head towards the exit. “Now, get out.”

As Odo turned towards the door, time seemed to slow. Instead of the joy you'd expected to feel, there was just a chilled emptiness in your gut. Your hand reached out a few centimetres towards the Constable, hovering by your waist like an awkward apology. If Odo saw the gesture, he didn't acknowledge it. The only noise you heard was the swishing of the doors as they closed behind him.

Slowly cupping your elbows in the palms of your hands, unable to face him outright, you turned your side towards Sisko and tried to look him in the face. The moment you met his humorless brown eyes, you wavered, casting you gaze at the glossy top of his desk. Your voice was quiet and quivering when you finally spoke. “Commander, I-”

“I don’t want your excuses, Doctor. You crossed the line," Sisko stated curtly. “I don’t know what they taught you in medical school but as long as you wear that uniform I expect you to act like a Starfleet Officer.”

You winced as his cold words hit you full force. There was nothing you could say to that. Sisko was absolutely right. Fighting the burning sensation building in your eyes, you quietly sniffed back your runny nose and stood at attention to receive your punishment.

“Odo is chief of security for a reason. I will _not_ have you disrespecting your fellow officers, **regardless** of how you feel about the situation. It is unprofessional, and will not be tolerated on this station. Is that understood?”

“Yes, sir," you whispered.

Sisko let out a frustrated sigh as he turned his chair to face away from you. “Dismissed.”

Wandering out of the Commander’s office was a task in and of itself. Determined not to meet anyone's gaze, you stumbled down the two stairs onto the main floor of Ops. Your eyes remained fixed to the floor the entire way to the turbolift. Pale and trying not to shake, you croaked out a command for the Promenade. As the lift jerked into a descent, you groaned and gripped the cold rail. 

That couldn’t have gone any worse.

 

 

The moment the lift stopped, you dragged your body through the throngs of people on the concourse. In your distressed state, all of them looked like faceless, colorful blurs. Snatches of conversations slipped by your ears sounding like nothing more than static. As you passed the jumja stand, you felt a painful shock to your right shoulder.

“Watch it, human!”

Slowly, you turned around to find a cat-like Antican male glaring at you through his white beard. You blinked at him for a moment, fuzzy brain trying to comprehend the situation. He crossed his arms, sneering at you as his ears flattened backwards. Finally, your thoughts caught up with you; that jarring you felt must have been you bumping into him.

Straightening your posture, you clasped your hands in front of you. Your head bowed low enough to touch your chin to your chest. “Please accept my sincerest apologies for this transgression.”

The Antican bared his fangs and pointed his hairy paw at you. “Next time,” the he grumbled, poking you harshly in the collar bone. “Pay attention!” 

You piously kept your head down. “I will.”

“Feh!” The Antican waved his furry arm at you dismissively and walked away. You waited until his skinny legs were out of sight before finally lifting your head. A dull pain throbbed down your shoulder, causing you to grip the back of your neck. You rubbed just below your left occipital condyle, trying to loosen the tense muscles. It felt like a strain. When did that happen?

“Maybe I should get a massage,” you murmured. 

 

Rolling your shoulders, you plodded stiffly onwards to what was now lovingly called: “The Vole Room”.

As every scientist knows, high stress levels in patients can severely impact the results of any study. In order to get accurate data, animals must be properly housed in a safe, secure, and comfortable environment. If one failed to provide for all the animals’ needs, it lead to biased data and, often, unusable results. To that end, you had taken a great deal of time to thoroughly plan "The Vole Room" to be the most optimum habitat for your guests. The goal was to recreate the dark and quiet conditions of Deep Space Nine’s inner workings. 

Before your drug trial began, Dax helped you select one of the most noiseless, out of the way, science labs to house the voles. In keeping with the Cardassian preference for dim conditions, you kept the lights at 50% power during the day, and only red light was permitted after 1600. Even the computer terminal would shut down automatically during the dark hours. O’Brien had also partioned off a small antechamber to prevent light pollution from the hallway. As with many species, voles were creatures of habit and change stressed them. The doors to the vole room were locked at all times to prevent unwanted visitors. To ensure consistent handling, there was only one science officer who baited, cleaned, and fed the voles at 0800 and 2000 every day. You were responsible for the 1300 snack time and medical examinations. In addition, you checked the feeding records on each vole and observed them for any stereotypies[1] which could indicate high stress levels. 

Small squeaking noises greeted you the moment you entered the lab. You glanced at a clock on the computer screen and realized it was about 1330. You cursed yourself for being late again. It was particularly crucial to feed animals at the same time every day and you were the only one who seemed unable to meet that requirement.

"Sorry guys, you must be hungry," you murmured, resting your hand atop the nearest enclosure. One of the female voles in that group looked up at you with black button eyes.

There were a total of twelve voles in your laboratory: four males and eight females. The two sexes were divided equally into treatment and control groups. The treatment group received bait laced with the birth control drug. The control voles received bait with no drug. Since you were not dispensing the bait, you were blinded to which vole received the drug. In fact, the technician didn’t know which preprogrammed bait formula (Vole Bait One or Vole Bait Two) was actually laced with the drug either. The only person who knew was Mr. O’Brien, who had programmed the replicator for you, and he was strictly forbidden from telling anyone until everything was done.

As voles are social animals, you opted to house them in groups of three voles: one male, two females. Males could not be housed with other males or they would fight to the death. Each housing unit contained one treated female, one control female and one male who was either in the treatment or control group. By having a control group under the exact same conditions as the treatment group, you could accurately determine what changes in behavior or biology were due to the birth control compound. When the breeding season started, the male vole would mate with the females in his group and you could determine if the birth control really worked. If it was successful, all control females would be pregnant, all treatment females would not be pregnant and the drug would have no effect on the male voles.

The female vole you were watching placed her front legs against the clear walls of her pen and began vigorously pawing at you. You smiled at her, setting down your tricorder set by the door. You opened the kit and used the disinfector tool to clean your hands again. Setting the tool back in the case, you made your way back to the supply cabinet. Pulling on a pair of disposable gloves, a hair net and a face mask, you walked over to the small replicator on the wall. “Vole Supplements 2B,” you ordered. The replicator glowed to life and provided a plate of small dead mice. You took the plate, moved back to the voles’ enclosure, and stared at the excited female. The hairless creature instantly recognized the plate and started to squeak loudly. This set off a chain reaction whereby all the other voles in the lab began to vocalize as well. The cacophony of loud, ear piercing noises almost made you drop their food. You set the plate down on top of the instigator’s enclosure and covered your ears. 

“Damn it guys!” you groaned, wincing at the shrill wailing. “I’m feeding you! I promise!”

Usually, after you fed the voles, you took your lunch at the console in the vole room. It was terrible for your social life, but quite useful for learning more about the voles. Sitting quietly and simply watching them, you were able to observe their normal inter-vole body language and behaviors. Over the past month and half, you learned that voles used sound as a major means of communication. To indicate pleasure or calm itself down, a vole purred loudly. Hissing indicated displeasure or fear. Loud chittering noises were a sign of impending aggression against a predator; your technician learned that the hard way and nearly lost her finger. Thankfully, the caterwauling only occurred when the voles anticipated being fed. You suspected it was a way of alerting the colony to a food source.

Normally, you would have opened their cages and fed the voles as fast as possible. However, something about seeing Martinez’s cats today struck you. Cats, like the voles, purred to calm themselves or indicate pleasure. If you slowly blinked at a cat, they could interpret it as “I am not a threat to you”; if done correctly, and to the right cat, they would return the blink and feel more comfortable around you. You wondered if you could use the voles own communication methods could produce a similar effect. 

In response to the female’s continued cries, you began to trill out a purring noise. Somehow, over all the wailing, a few voles managed to hear you. A nearby male blinked slowly at you and began to purr himself. One by one, every vole in the room began to mimic the sound, until all that you could hear was a soft rumbling. Your eyes went wide. 

This was… **amazing**! 

Continuing the purring the noise, you sneakily lifted the plate and began to distribute the food. Gently, you placed three mice in multiple locations around each habitat. Eventually, the purring gave way to the sound of munching. You stood back and watched your furry kingdom with great excitement. Wait until you told everyone about this! Of course, they couldn’t see it in person or they would disturb the voles, but even a video recording of this would be impressive. You couldn’t wait to see the look on Commander Sisko’s face when-

Oh, wait a minute.

…

...

Fuck...

You chest tightened as you thought about your behavior not thirty minutes previous. Sisko was absolutely right, you had crossed the line. Frustrated or not, nothing justified you arguing like a child. By failing to maintain professional composure, your opinion was invalidated by your behavior. Now you would have more paperwork and you had no one to blame but yourself. Worse yet, you felt awful for what you had said to Odo. No matter how worn and weary you felt, accusing the security chief of not doing his job was an all time low.

A hollow sinking feeling overwhelmed you, driving away any desire you had to eat. With a self loathing groan, you threw yourself into your chair and rested your head on your computer consul. “Why didn’t I just shut the hell up?! I acted like a bigger asshole than Dr. Doolittle,” you moaned, burying your face in your arms. 

A small rustling noise caught your attention. You turned your head and looked around the room for the source. In the first enclosure, the excitable female vole had resumed her pawing. You blinked slowly at her; she returned the blink. Congratulations, hero! You have successfully traded your social life and capacity to sleep for the ability to make friends with a vole. Quite the accomplishment that. You win the most useless talent award.

A burning sensation in your nose alerted you to your slipping emotional control before you could be overwhelmed. Choking back your feelings for a few more seconds, you scanned the lab. Sure enough, nobody home but the voles. Your vision began to blur as your eyes teared up. Finally, you laid your red face on your arm and gave into your self-loathing.

Sometimes, everyone just needs a good cry to get their shit together.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> **[1]** Stereotypies are ritualistic, repetitive patterns of maladaptive behavior that serve no purpose. In captive animals, such as zoo or lab animals, these often develop from a lack of proper stimulation. Relentless pacing, excessive grooming, rocking, and excessive sleeping are all examples of sterotypies. After a while, performing the repetitive behavior causes a release of endorphins in the brain and, eventually, leads to the behavior being self rewarding. Therefore, animals who learned a sterotypie may continue to display the abnormal behavior even after their environment has been enriched and improved.
> 
> http://books.google.com/books?id=8ioLy42v9CAC&lpg=PA83&ots=6dUl8N4cAM&dq=stereotypies%20in%20animals%20avma&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=false
> 
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lJzA7Y36h_Y


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